Chapter XII: The Philosophy of Lucretius (2)

The vigour with which he reasons from known to unknown facts and causes may be judged most fairly by his arguments on the progress of society, where he is more on an equality with modern speculation. He discards, altogether, as might be expected, the fancies concerning a heroic or a golden age, and assumes as his data the facts of human nature as observed in his own day. The grounds from which he starts, his method of reasoning, and the nature of his conclusions remind a reader of the positive tendencies of Thucydides, as they are displayed in the introduction to his history. The importance of personal qualities, such as beauty, strength, and power of mind, in the earliest stage of civil society, the influence of accumulated wealth at a later period, the causes of the establishment and overthrow of tyrannies and of the rise of commonwealths in their room, are all set forth with a degree of strong sense and historical sagacity, such as no other Roman writer has shown in similar investigations. The inferiority even of Tacitus in his occasional digressions into the philosophy of history is very marked. On such topics, where the data were accessible to the natural faculties of observation and inference, and where conclusions were sought which, without aiming at definite certainty, should yet be true in the main, the reader of Lucretius has no sense of that wasted ingenuity which he often feels in following the investigations into some of the primary conditions of the atoms, the component elements of the soul, the process by which the world was formed, or the causes of electric or volcanic phenomena.

Lucretius makes a copious, and often a very happy use, of analogies, both in the illustration of his philosophy, and in passages of the highest poetical power. Some of the most striking of the former kind have already been noticed as sources of error, or at least of disguising ignorance, in his reasoning, viz., those founded on the supposed parallel between the world and the human body; others again are employed with force and ingenuity in support of various positions in his argument. Among these may be mentioned his comparison of the effect of various combinations of the same letters in forming different words, with that of the various combinations of similar atoms in forming different objects in nature. So too the ceaseless motion of the atoms is brought visibly before the imagination by the analogy of the motes dancing in the sunbeam. There is something striking in the comparison of the human body immediately after death to wine 'cum Bacchi flos evanuit,' and again, in that of the relation of body and soul to the relation of frankincense and its odour--

E thuris glaebis evellere odorem
Haud facile est quin intereat natura quoque eius.[404]

But this faculty of his understanding is in general so united with the imaginative feeling through which he discerns the vital indentity of the most diverse manifestations of some common principle, that it can best be illustrated in connexion with the poetical, as distinct from the logical, merits of the work.

So also it is difficult to separate his faculty of clear, exact, and vivid observation from his poetical perception of the life and beauty of Nature. His powers of observation were, however, stimulated and directed by scientific as well as poetic interest in phenomena. From the wide scope of his philosophy he was led to examine the greatest variety of facts, physical as well as moral. His sense of the immensity of the universe led him to contemplate the largest and widest operations of Nature,--such as the movements of the heavenly bodies, the recurrence of the seasons, the forces of great storms, volcanoes, etc.; while, again, the theory of the invisible atoms drew his attention to the minutest processes of Nature, in so far as they can be perceived or inferred without the appliances of modern science. Thus, for instance, in a long passage beginning--

Denique fluctifrago suspensae in litore vestes,[405]

he shows by an accumulation of instances that there are many invisible bodies, the existence of which is inferred from visible effects. In other places he draws attention to the class of facts which have been the basis of the modern science of geology,--such as the mark of rivers slowly wearing away their banks,--of walls on the sea-shore mouldering from the long-continued effects of the exhalations from the sea,--of the fall of great rocks from the mountains under the wear and tear of ages.

Again, the argument is frequently illustrated by observation of the habits of various animals. In these passages Lucretius shows the curiosity of a naturalist, as well as the sympathetic feeling and insight of a poet. How graphic, for instance, is his description of dogs following up the scent of their game--

Errant saepe canes itaque et vestigia quaerunt.[406]

How happily their characteristics are struck off in the line--

At levisomna canum fido cum pectore corda.[407]

The various cries and habits of birds are often observed and described, as--

Et validis cycni torrentibus ex Heliconis
Cum liquidam tollunt lugubri voce querellam;[408]

and again--

Parvus ut est cycni melior canor ille gruum quam
Clamor in aetheriis dispersus nubibus austri.[409]

The description of sea-birds,

Mergique marinis
Fluctibus in salso victum vitamque petentes,[410]

recalls the vivid and natural life of those that haunted the isle of Calypso--

τανύγλωσσοί τε κορῶναι
εἰνάλιαι τῇσίν τε θαλάσσια ἔργα μέμηλεν.[411]

His lively personal observation and active interest in the casual objects presented to his eyes in the course of his walks are seen in such passages as--

Cum lubrica serpens
Exuit in spinis vestem; nam saepe videmus
Illorum spoliis vepres volitantibus auctas.[412]

There is also much truth and liveliness of observation in his notices of psychological and physiological facts; as in those passages where he establishes the connexion between mind and body, and in his account of the senses. With what a graphic touch does he paint the outward effects of death[413], the decay of the faculties with age, and the madness that overtakes the mind--

Adde furorem animi proprium atque oblivia rerum,
Adde quod in nigras lethargi mergitur undas;[414]

the bodily waste, produced by long-continuous speaking--

Perpetuus sermo nigrai noctis ad umbram
Aurorae perductus ab exoriente nitore;[415]

the reflex action of the senses, produced by the nervous strain of witnessing games and spectacles for many days in succession; the insensibility to the pain of the severest wounds in the excitement of battle! In his account of the plague of Athens, in which he enters into much greater detail than Thucydides, he displays the minute observation of a physician, as well as the profound thought of a moralist.

The 'vivida vis' of his understanding is apparent also in the clearness and consecutiveness of his philosophical style. His complaint of 'the poverty of his native tongue' is directed against the capacities of the Latin language for scientific, not for poetical expression--

Nunc et Anaxagorae scrutemur Homoeomerian
Quam Grai memorant nec nostra dicere lingua
Concedit nobis patrii sermonis egestas.[416]

That language, which gives admirable expression to the dictates of common sense and to the dignified emotions which inspire the conduct of great affairs, is ill adapted both for the expression of abstract ideas and for maintaining a long process of connected argument. Lucretius has occasionally to meet the first difficulty by the adoption of Graecisms, and the second by some sacrifice of artistic elegance. Thus he uses _omne_ for τὸ πᾶν (11. 1108), _esse_, again, for τὸ εἶναι, and the like. Something of a formal and technical character appears in the links by which his argument is kept together, as in the constantly recurring use of certain connecting particles, such as the 'etenim,' 'quippe ubi,' 'quod genus,' 'amplius hoc,' 'huc accedit,' and the like. Virgil has retained some of the most striking of these connecting formulae, such as 'contemplator item,' 'nonne vides,' etc; but, as was natural in a poem setting forth precepts and not proofs, he uses them much more sparingly and with more careful selection. As used by Lucretius, they add to our sense of the vividness of the book, of the constant personal address of the author, and of his ardent polemical tone. They also keep the framework of the argument more compact and distinct: but they bring into greater prominence the artistic mistake of conducting an abstract discussion in verse. The very merits of the work considered as an argument,--its clearness, fullness, and consecutiveness,--detract from the pleasure which a work of art naturally produces. But the style cannot be too highly praised for its logical coherence and lucid illustration. The meaning of Lucretius can never be mistaken from any ambiguity in his language. There are difficulties arising from the uncertainty of the text, difficulties also from our unfamiliarity with his method and principles, or with the objects he describes, but none from confusion in his ideas or his reasoning, or from a vague or unreal use of words.

II.--THE SPECULATIVE IDEAS IN LUCRETIUS.

But it is in his grasp of speculative ideas, and in his application of them to interpret the living world, that the greatness of Lucretius as an imaginative thinker is most apparent. The substantial truth of all the ancient philosophies lay in the ideas which they attempted to express and embody, not in the symbols by which these ideas were successively represented. Lucretius has a place among the few adventurous thinkers of antiquity who attained to high eminences of contemplation, which were hidden from the mass of their contemporaries, and which, in the breadth of view afforded by them, are not far below the higher levels of our modern conceptions of Nature and human life. And there came to him, as to the earlier race of thinkers, that which comes so rarely to modern enquiry, the fresh and poetical sense of surprise and keen curiosity, as at the first discovery of a new country, or the first unfolding of some illimitable prospect.

(1) In the philosophy of Lucretius the world is conceived as absolutely under the government of law. The starting-point of his system--

Nullam rem e nilo gigni divinitus unquam,

is an inference from the recognition of this condition. There is no need to prove its truth: it is openly revealed in all the processes of Nature. This fact of universal order is indeed supposed to result from the eternal and immutable properties of the atoms and from the original limitation in their varieties: but the idea of law is prior to, and the condition of, all the principles enunciated in the first two books, in regard to the nature and properties of matter. In no ancient writer do we find the certainty and universality of law more emphatically and unmistakably expressed than in Lucretius. This is the final appeal in all controversy. The superiority of Epicurus is proclaimed on the ground of his having discovered the fixed and certain limitations of all existence--

Unde refert nobis victor quid possit oriri,
Quid nequeat, finita potestas denique cuique
Quanam sit ratione atque alte terminus haerens.[417]

Following on his steps the poet himself professes to teach--

Quo quaeque creata
Foedere sint, in eo quam sit durare necessum,
Nec validas valeant aevi rescindere leges.[418]

In another place he says--

Et quid quaeque queant per foedera naturai
Quid porro nequeant, sancitum quandoquidem extat.[419]

All knowledge and speculative confidence are declared to rest on this truth--

Certum ac dispositumst ubi quicquit crescat et insit.[420]

Superstition, the great enemy of truth, is said to be the result of ignorance of 'what may be and what may not be.' This is the thought which underlies and gives cogency to the whole argument. The subject of the poem is 'maiestas cognita rerum,'--the revelation of the majesty and order of the universe. The doctrine proclaimed by Lucretius was, that creation was no result of a capricious or benevolent exercise of power, but of certain processes extending through infinite time, by means of which the atoms have at length been able to combine and work together in accordance with their ultimate conditions. The conception of these ultimate conditions and of their relations to one another involves some more vital agency than that of blind chance or an iron fatalism.[421] The 'foedera naturai' are opposed to the 'foedera fati.' The idea of law in Nature, as understood by Lucretius, is not merely that of invariable sequence or concomitance of phenomena. It implies at least the further idea of a 'secreta facultas' in the original elements. This idea is not, necessarily, inconsistent with that of a creative will determining the original conditions of the elemental substances. If the ultimate principles of Lucretius were incompatible with a belief in the popular religions of antiquity, his mode of conceiving the operation of law in the universe is not irreconcileable with the conceptions of modern Theism.

The idea of law not only supports the whole fabric of his physical philosophy, but moulds his convictions on human life and imparts to his poetry that contemplative elevation by which it is pervaded. It is from this ground that he makes his most powerful assault on the strongholds of superstition. Nature is thus declared to be free from the arbitrary and capricious agency of the gods:--

Libera continuo dominis privata superbis.[422]

Man also is under the same law, and is made free by his knowledge and acceptance of this condition. A sense of security is thus gained for human life; a sense of elevation above its weakness and passions, and the courage to bear its inevitable evils[423]. This absolute reliance on law does not act upon his mind with the depressing influence of fatalism. Although the fortunes of life and the phases of individual character are said to be the results of the infinite combinations of blind atoms, yet man is made free by knowledge and the use of his reason. Notwithstanding the original constitution of his nature, arising out of influences over which there is no control, he still has it in his power to live a life worthy of the gods:--

Illud in his rebus videor firmare potesse,
Usque adeo naturarum vestigia linqui
Parvola, quae nequeat ratio depellere nobis
Ut nil inpediat dignam dis degere vitam.[424]

From these high places of his philosophy,--'the "templa serena" well-bulwarked by the learning of the wise'[425] he derives not only a sense of certainty in thought and security in life, but also his wide contemplative view, and his profound feeling of the majesty of the universe. The idea of universal law enables him to apprehend in all the processes of Nature a presence which awakens reverence and enforces obedience. This idea imparts unity of tone to the whole poem, informs its language, and seems to mould the very rhythm of its verse.

(2) But a closer view brings another aspect of the world into light; viz., the interdependence of all things on one another. There is not only fixed order, but there is also infinite mobility in Nature. The sum of all things remains unchanged, though all individual existences decay and perish. So too the sum of force remains the same[426]. There is no rest anywhere; all things are continually changing and passing into one another; decay and renovation form the very life and being of all things. Nothing is ever lost. 'Nature repairs one thing from another, and allows of no birth except through the death of something else':--

Haud igitur penitus pereunt quaecumque videntur,
Quando alid ex alio reficit natura nec ullam
Rem gigni patitur nisi morte adiuta aliena?[427]

As the 'ever-during peace' at the heart of all things is supposed to result from the eternal and immutable properties of the atoms, this 'endless agitation' arises out of their unceasing motion through infinite space. There are two kinds of motion,--the one tending to the renewal,--the other, to the destruction of things as they now exist. The maintenance of our whole system depends on the equilibrium of these opposing forces--

Sic aequo geritur certamine principiorum
Ex infinito contractum tempore bellum.[428]

There is thus seen to be not only absolute order, but also infinite change in the processes of Nature. Decay and renovation, death and life, support the existing creation in unceasing harmony. The imagination represents this process under the impressive symbol of an endless battle, in which now one side now the other gains some position, but neither, as yet, can become master of the field--

Nunc hinc nunc illic superant vitalia rerum,
Et superantur item.[429]

This symbol is the poetical form of the old philosophical distinction of αὔξησις and φθορά. It is another form of the ἔρις and φιλία which to the imagination of Empedocles appeared to pervade the universe. The idea of a constant battle imparts to the infinite and all-pervading movement of Nature the interest and the life of human passion on the grandest and widest sphere of action. The greatness of the thought makes each particular object in Nature pregnant with a deeper meaning, associates trivial and ordinary phenomena with a sense of imaginative wonder, and throws an august solemnity around the familiar aspects of human life. The passage in which this principle is most powerfully announced at ii. 575, &c., swells into deeper and grander tones, as the real human pathos involved in this strife of elements is made manifest. This struggle of life and decay is no mere war of abstractions: it is the daily and hourly process of existence. Birth and death are the fulfilment of this law. 'The old order changeth, yielding place to new'--

Cedit enim rerum novitate extrusa vetustas.[430]

'New nations wax strong, while the old are waning away; the generations of living things are changed within a brief space, and, like the runners in a race, pass on the torch of life'--

Augescunt aliae gentes, aliae minuuntur,
Inque brevi spatio mutantur saecla animantum
Et quasi cursores vitai lampada tradunt.[431]

Man also must resign himself to the universal law, and accept his life not as a thing to be possessed for ever, but only to be used for a time--

Sic alid ex alio numquam desistet oriri
Vitaque mancipio nulli datur, omnibus usu.[432]

Under this law of universal decay and restoration, we see the rains of heaven lost in the earth, but passing into new life in the fruits from which all living things are supported--

Hinc alitur porro nostrum genus atque ferarum,
Hinc laetas urbes pueris florere videmus
Frondiferasque novis avibus canere undique silvas.[433]

Or we see the waters of a river lost in the sea and returning through the earth to their original source, and again flowing in a fresh stream along the channel first formed for them--

Inde super terras fluit agmine dulci
Qua via secta semel liquido pede detulit undas.[434]

Under the same law the earth is seen to be the parent of all things and their tomb (v. 259); the sea, which loses its substance through evaporation and the subsidence of its waters, is found to be ever renewed by its native sources and the abundant tribute of rivers (v. 267; i. 231; vi. 608); the air is ever giving away and receiving back its substance; the sun ('liquidi fons luminis'), moon, and stars, are ever losing and ever renewing their light. The day on which the 'long-sustained mass and fabric of the world' will pass away, leaving only void space and the viewless atoms, is destined to come suddenly through the termination of this long balanced warfare:--

Denique tantopere inter se cum maxima mundi
Pugnent membra, pio nequaquam concita bello,
Nonne vides aliquam longi certaminis ollis
Posse dari finem? vel cum sol et vapor omnis
Omnibus epotis umoribus exsuperarint;
Quod facere intendunt, neque adhuc conata patrantur.[435]

(3.) It is to be observed, also, how vividly Lucretius realises and how steadfastly he keeps before his mind the ideas of the eternity and infinity of the primordial atoms and of space. These conceptions support him in his antagonism to the popular religion, and deepen the feeling with which he contemplates human life and Nature. Our world of earth, sea, and sky is only one among infinite other systems. It stands to the universe in much the same proportion as any single man to the whole earth--

Et videas caelum summai totius unum
Quam sit parvula pars et quam multesima constet
Nec tota pars, homo terrai quota totius unus.[436]

It was the glory of Epicurus that he first passed beyond the empyrean that bounds our world--

Atque omne immensum peragravit mente animoque.[437]

The immensity of the universe is incompatible with the constant agency and interference of the gods,--

Quis regere immensi summam, quis habere profundi
Indu manu validas potis est moderanter habenas.[438]

This negative idea is, at least, a step in advance towards a higher conception of the attributes of Deity. The infinity and complexity of the universe protest against the limited and divided powers, as the natural feelings of human nature protest against the moral qualities attributed to the gods of the Pagan mythology.

The power of these conceptions is also seen in the poet's deep sense of the littleness of human life. Such pathetic expressions of the shortness and triviality of each man's mortal span, as that,--

Degitur hoc aevi quodcumquest,[439]

are called forth by the ever-present thought of the Infinite and the Eternal. But this thought, if associated with a feeling of the pathos of human life does not lead Lucretius into cynicism or despair. It rather elevates him and fortifies him to suppress all personal complaint in the presence of ideas so stupendous. His imagination expands in contemplating the objects either of thought or of sight, which produce the impression of immensity,--such as the vast expanse of earth, sea and sky,--or of great duration,--such as the 'aeterni sidera mundi' or the 'validas aevi vires.' Thus, as much of the majesty of his poetry may be connected with his contemplative sense of law, much of its pervading life with his sense of the mobility of Nature, so the sublimity of many passages may be resolved into the influence of the ideas of immensity, both of time and space, on his imagination.

(4.) Another aspect of things vividly realised by Lucretius is that of their individuality. It was in the atomic philosophy, that the thought of 'the individual' first rose into prominence. The meaning of the word 'atom' is simply 'individual.' The sense of each separate existence is not merged in the conception of law, of change, or of the immensity of the universe. The atoms are not only infinite in number, they are also varied in kind and powerful in solid singleness,--'solida pollentia simplicitate.' From their variety and individuality the variety and individuality in Nature emerge. No two classes and no two single objects are exactly alike. Between any two of the birds that gladden the sea-shore, the river banks, or the woods, there is some difference in outward appearance--

Invenies tamen inter se differre figuris.[440]

Each individual of a flock is different from every other, and by this difference only can the mother recognise her offspring. This sense of individuality intensifies the pathos of many passages in the poem. By regarding each being as having an existence of its own, the poet enters with sympathy into the feelings of all sentient existence,--of dumb animals as well as of human creatures. The freshness and distinctness of all his pictures from Nature are the result of an eye trained by his philosophy to see each thing not only as part of the universal life, but as existing in and for itself.

(5.) The thought, also, of the infinite subtlety of combination in the elements and forces of the world acts powerfully on his imagination. The individuality of things depends on the fact that no two are composed of exactly the same elements, combined in the same way. The infinity of the elements, the immensity of the spaces in which they meet, and the infinite possibilities in their modes of combination result in the endless variety of beauty and wonder which the world presents to the eye. The epithet 'daedala,' by which this subtlety is expressed is applied not only to Nature, but to the earth as the sphere in which the elements are most largely mixed, and the creative forces most powerfully active. The varied loveliness of the world,--the 'varii lepores,' by which the eye is gratified and relieved,--are the result of the variety in the elements and the infinite subtlety in their modes of combination. Their invisibility and inscrutable action enhance the imaginative sense of the power and beauty resulting from these causes.

(6.) The abstract properties of the atoms, discussed in the first two books, so far from being arbitrary assumptions, without any relation to actual existence, are thus found to be the conditions which explain the order, life, immensity, individuality, and subtlety manifested in the universe. These conceptions, which bridge the chasm between the particles of lifeless matter and the living world, unite in the more general conception of Nature. What then is involved in this conception--the dominant conception of the poem in its philosophical as well as its imaginative aspects? Something more than the subsidiary conceptions mentioned above. There is, in the first place, all that is involved in the unity of an organic whole. But to this whole the imagination of the poet seems, in some passages, to attach attributes scarcely reconcileable with the mechanical principles of his philosophy. In emancipating himself from the religious traditions of antiquity, Lucretius did not altogether escape from the power of an idea, so deeply rooted in the thought of past ages, as to seem to be an integral element of human consciousness. It is against the limitations which the ancient mythology imposed on the idea of Divine agency, rather than against the idea itself as it is understood in modern times, that his philosophy protests. To Nature his imagination attributes not only life, but creative and regulative power. There would be more truth in calling this conception pantheistic than atheistic. But the sense of will, freedom, individual life, is so strong in Lucretius, that we think of the 'natura daedala rerum' rather as a personal power, with attributes in some respects analogous to those of man, than as a being in whose existence all other life is merged. Though this figurative attribution of personal qualities to great natural forces cannot be pressed as evidence of philosophical belief, yet as it shows, on the one hand, an unconscious survival of the state of mind which gave birth to mythology, so it seems to be the unconscious awakening of a spiritual conception of a creative and sustaining power in the universe.

This new and more vital conception which supersedes the old mythological modes of thought is not altogether independent of them. Lucretius still interprets the world by analogies and illustrations which attach personal attributes to different phases and forces of Nature. Thus he speaks of Aether as the fructifying father, of Earth as the great mother of all living things. But the survival of the mythological conception of the universe, blended indeed with other modes of imaginative thought, appears most conspicuously in the famous invocation to the poem,--

Aeneadum genetrix, hominum divomque voluptas,
Alma Venus.

The mysterious power there addressed is identified with the Alma Venus of Italian worship,--the abstract conception of the life-giving impulse, the operations of which are most visible in the new birth of the early spring,--and with the Aphrodite of Greek art and poetry,--the concrete and passionate conception of the beauty and charm which most fascinate the senses. But if nothing more was meant in the opening lines of the poem than a fanciful appeal to one of the Deities of the popular belief, it might with justice be said that some of the finest poetry in Lucretius directly contradicted his sincerest convictions. But the language in which she is addressed clearly proves that the 'Alma Venus' of the invocation is not an independent capricious power, separate from the orderly action of Nature. She is emphatically addressed as a Power, present through all the world,--

Caeli subter labentia signa
Quae mare navigerum quae terras frugiferentis
Concelebras.

She is not only omnipresent, but all-creative,--

Per te quoniam genus omne animantum
Concipitur,--

and all-regulative--

Quae quoniam renum naturam sola gubernas, &c.

Thus under the name, and with some of the attributes of the Goddess of Mythology, the genial force of Nature,--'Natura Naturans' as distinct from the 'rerum summa,' or 'Natura Naturata,'--is apprehended as a living, all-pervading energy, the cause of all life, joy, beauty, and order in the world, the cause too of all grace and accomplishment in man. To this mysterious Power, from which all joy and loveliness are silently emanating, the poet, (remembering at the same time that the friend to whom he dedicates his poem claims especially to be under the protection of that Goddess with whom she is identified), prays for inspiration,--

Quo magis aeternum da dictis, diva leporem.[441]

Here, as in earlier invocations of the Muse, there is a recognition of the truth that the feeling, the imagery, and the words of the poet come to him in a way which he does not understand,--

ἡμεῖς δὲ κλέος οἶον ἀκούομεν, οὐδέ τι ἴδμεν,--

and by the gift of a Power which he cannot command. Like Goethe, Lucretius seems to feel that his thoughts and feelings pass into form and musical expression under the influence of the same vital movement which in early spring fills the world with new life and beauty. But still true to his philosophy, and remembering the Empedoclean thought[442], which recurs with impressive solemnity in his argument, that this life-giving energy is inseparably united with a destructive energy, and seeing at the same time before his imagination the figures and colouring of some great masterpiece of Greek art, he embodies his conception in a passionately wrought picture of the loves of Aphrodite and Ares, and concludes with a prayer that the gracious Power whom he invokes would prevail on the fierce God of War to grant a time of peace to his country.

If to regard this passage as merely an artistic ornament of the poem would be unjust to the sincerity of Lucretius as a thinker, to regard it merely as a piece of elaborate symbolism would be still more unjust to his genius as a poet. It is a truth both of thought and of imaginative feeling that there is a pervading and puissant energy in the world, manifesting itself most powerfully in animate and inanimate creation, when the deadness of winter gives place to the genial warmth of spring,--

Tibi rident aequora ponti
Placatumque nitet diffuso lumine caelum;--

manifesting itself also in the human spirit in the form of genius, calling into life new feelings and fancies of the poet, and shaping them into forms of imperishable beauty. Whether consistently or inconsistently with the ultimate tenets of his philosophy, the poet, in this invocation, seems to recognise, behind these manifestations of unconscious energy, the presence of a conscious Being with which his own spirit can hold communion, and from which it draws inspiration. With similar inconsistency or consistency a modern physicist speaks of 'the impression of joy given in the unfolding of leaf and the spreading of plant as irresistibly suggesting the thought of a great Being conscious of this joy.'

But this puissant and joy-giving energy, personified in the 'Alma Venus genetrix,' is only one of the aspects which the 'Natura daedala rerum' of Lucretius presents to man. She seems to stand to him rather in the position of a task-mistress than of a beneficent Being, ministering to his wants. The Gods receive all things from her bounty,--

Omnia suppeditat porro Natura,[443]--

and the lower animals who 'wage no foolish strife with her' have their wants also abundantly satisfied:--

Quando omnibus omnia large
Tellus ipsa parit Naturaque daedala rerum.[444]

But to man she is the cause of evil as well as of good; of shipwrecks, earthquakes, pestilence, and untimely death, as well as of all beauty and delight. Sometimes he seems to hear her speaking to him in the tones of stern reproof,--

Denique si vocem rerum Natura repente, etc.[445]

Again he sees her rising up before him like the old Nemesis of Greek religion, and trampling with secret irony on the pride and pomp of human affairs,--

Usque adeo res humanas vis abdita quaedam
Opterit et pulchros fascis saevasque secures
Proculcare ac ludibrio sibi habere videtur.[446]

It is this large conception of Nature which seems to bring the abstract doctrines of Lucretius into harmony with his poetical feelings and his human sensibilities. The poetry of the living world is thus breathed into the dry bones of the Atomic system of Democritus. The unity which the mind strains to grasp in contemplating the universe is thus made compatible with the perception of individual life in everything. The pathos and dignity of human life are enhanced by the recognition of our dependence on this great Power above and around us. The contemplation of this Power affects the imagination with a sense of awe, wonder, and majesty. But with this contemplative emotion a still deeper feeling seems to mingle. Throughout the poem there is heard a deep undertone of solemnity as from one awakening to the apprehension of a great invisible Power,--'a concealed omnipotence,'--in the world. As the imagination of Lucretius is immeasurably more poetical, so is his spirit immeasurably more reverential than that of Epicurus. If by the analysis of his understanding he seems to take all mystery and sanctity out of the universe, he restores them again by the synthesis of his imagination. If his work seems in some places to 'teach a truth he could not learn,' this is to be explained partly by the fact that he sometimes leaves the beaten road of Epicureanism for the higher and less defined tracks,--'avia loca,'--along which the mystic enthusiasm of Empedocles had borne him. But partly it may be explained by the fact that the poetic imagination, which was in him the predominant faculty, asserts its right to be heard after the logical understanding has said its last word. The imagination which recognises infinite life and order in the world unconsciously assumes the existence of a creative and governing Power, behind the visible framework of things. Even the germ of such a thought was more elevating than the popular idolatry and superstition. The recognition of the majesty of Nature enables Lucretius to contemplate life with a sense both of solemnity and security, while it imparts a more elevated feeling to his enjoyment of the beauty of the world. The belief which he taught and by which he lived is neither atheistic nor pantheistic; it is not definite enough to be theistic. It was like the twilight between the beliefs that were passing away, and that which rose on the world after his time,--

ἦμος δ᾽ οὔτ᾽ ἄρ πω ἠώς, ἔτι δ᾽ ἀμφιλύκη νύξ.

[Footnote 376: 'First, by reason of the greatness of my argument, and because I set the mind free from the close drawn bonds of superstition; and next because, on so dark a theme, I compose such lucid verse, touching every point with the grace of poesy.'--i. 931-34.]

[Footnote 377: Of Leucippus, with whose name the theory is also associated, very little is known.]

[Footnote 378: 'This terror of the soul, therefore, and this darkness must be dispelled, not by the rays of the sun or the bright shafts of day, but by the outward aspect and harmonious plan of nature.'--i. 146-48.]

[Footnote 379: i. 445-56.]

[Footnote 380: 'The original atoms are, therefore, of solid singleness, composed of the smallest particles in close and compact union, not kept together by any meeting of these particles, but rather powerful by their eternal singleness, from which nature allows no loss by violence or decay, storing them as the seeds of all things.'--i. 609-14.]

[Footnote 381: ii. 297-302.]

[Footnote 382: ii. 549.]

[Footnote 383: ii. 575-76]

[Footnote 384: 'If we are to suppose the existence of an eternal substance, at the basis of all things, on which the safety of the whole universe rests, lest you find creation resolved into nonentity.'--ii. 862-64.]

[Footnote 385: 'So soon as the deep rest of death hath fallen upon a man, and the mind and the life have departed from him, there is no loss in his whole frame to be perceived, either in appearance or in weight. Death still presents everything that was before, except the vital sense and the warm heat.'--iii. 211-15.]

[Footnote 386: 'For, not only would all reason come to nought, even life itself would immediately be overthrown, unless you dare to trust the senses.'--iv. 507-8.]

[Footnote 387: i. 135.]

[Footnote 388: 'Since nothing in our body has been produced in order that we might be able to put it to use, but what has been produced creates its own use.'--iv. 834-35.]

[Footnote 389: 'And love impaired their strength, and children, by their coaxing ways, easily broke down the proud temper of their fathers.'--v. 1017-18.]

[Footnote 390: vi. 60-1.]

[Footnote 391: E.g. i. 54; v. 154.]

[Footnote 392: Macaulay.]

[Footnote 393: E.g. i. 694.]

[Footnote 394: iv. 478-79.]

[Footnote 395:

'In quae corpora si nullus tibi forte videtur
Posse animi iniectus fieri, procul avius erras.'--ii. 739-40.

]

[Footnote 396: 'But it is necessary that the atoms, in the act of creation, should exercise some secret, invisible faculty.'--i. 778-79.]

[Footnote 397: 'Since on all sides, through all the pores of aether, and, as it were, all round through the breathing-places of the mighty world, a free exit and entrance is given to the atoms.'--vi. 492-94.]

[Footnote 398: 'As feathers, and hair, and bristles are first formed on the limbs of beasts and the bodies of birds, so the young earth then first bore herbs and plants, afterwards gave birth to the generations of living things.'--v. 788-91.]

[Footnote 399: 'So more and more, the sweat oozing from the salt body, increased the sea and the moving watery plains by its flow.'--v. 487-88.]

[Footnote 400: 'Since neither its veins can support adequate nourishment, nor does Nature supply what is needful.'--ii. 1141-42.]

[Footnote 401: 'For one thing will grow clear after another: nor shall the darkness of night make thee lose thy way, before thou seest, to the full, the furthest secrets of Nature: so shall all things throw light one on the other.'--i. 1115-17.]

[Footnote 402: 'Dishonouring immortal things by mortal words.'--v. 121.]

[Footnote 403: 'They, doubtless, became the prey and the gain of others, unable to break through the bonds of fate by which they were confined, until Nature caused that species to disappear.'--v. 875-77.

Mr. Wallace (Epicureanism, p. 114) in commenting on this passage adds, 'Of course in this there is no implication of the peculiarly Darwinian doctrine of descent, or development of kind from kind, with structure modified and complicated to meet changing circumstances.']

[Footnote 404: iii. 327-28.]

[Footnote 405: i. 305.]

[Footnote 406: iv. 705.]

[Footnote 407: 'Dogs, lightly sleeping, with faithful heart.'--v. 864.]

[Footnote 408: 'When from the strong torrents of Helicon the swans raise their liquid wailing with doleful voice.'--iv. 547-48.]

[Footnote 409: 'As the low note of the swan is sweeter than the cry of the cranes, far-scattered among the south-wind's skiey clouds.'--iv. 181-82.]

[Footnote 410: 'And gulls among the sea-waves, seeking their food and pastime in the brine.'--v. 1079-80.]

[Footnote 411: Od. vi. 66.]

[Footnote 412: 'And likewise, when the lithe serpent casts its skin among the thorns; for often we notice the briers, with their light airy spoils hanging to them.'--iv. 60-2.]

[Footnote 413: iii. 213-15.]

[Footnote 414: 'Consider, too, the special madness of the mind, and forgetfulness of things; consider its sinking into the black waves of lethargy.'--iii. 828-29.]

[Footnote 415: 'Unbroken speech prolonged from the first light of dawn till the shadows of the dark night.'--iv. 537-38.]

[Footnote 416: 'Now, too, let us examine the "Homoeomeria" of Anaxagoras, as the Greeks call it, though the poverty of our native speech does not admit of its being named in our language.'--i. 830-33.]

[Footnote 417: 'Whence returning victorious he brings back to us tidings of what may and what may not come into existence: on what principle, in fine, the power of each thing is determined and the deeply-fixed limit of its being.'--i. 75-77.]

[Footnote 418: 'According to what condition all things have been created, what necessity there is that they abide by it, and how they may not annul the mighty laws of the ages.'--v. 56-58.]

[Footnote 419: 'Since it is absolutely decreed, what each thing can and what it cannot do, by the conditions of nature.'--i. 586.]

[Footnote 420: 'It is fixed and ordered where each thing may grow and exist.'--iii. 787.]

[Footnote 421: ii. 254.]

[Footnote 422: ii. 1091.]

[Footnote 423: vi. 32.]

[Footnote 424: 'This, in these circumstances, I think I can establish, that such faint traces of our native elements are left beyond the powers of our reason to dispel, that nothing prevents us from leading a life worthy of the gods.'--iii. 319-22.]

[Footnote 425: ii. 8.]

[Footnote 426: ii. 297-99.]

[Footnote 427: i. 262-64.]

[Footnote 428: ii. 573-74.]

[Footnote 429: ii. 575-76.]

[Footnote 430: iii. 964.]

[Footnote 431: ii. 77-79.]

[Footnote 432: 'So one thing shall never cease being born from another, and life is given to no man as a possession, to all for use.'--iii. 970-71.]

[Footnote 433: 'Hence, moreover, the race of man and the beasts of the forest are fed; hence we see cities glad with the flower of their children, and the leafy woods on all sides loud with the song of young birds.'--i. 254-56.]

[Footnote 434: v. 271-72.]

[Footnote 435: 'Finally, since the vast members of the world, engaged in no holy warfare, so mightily contend with one another, see'st thou not that some end may be assigned to their long conflict, either when the sun and every mode of heat, having drunk up all the moisture, shall have gained the day, which they are ever tending to do, but do not yet accomplish?' etc.--v. 380-85.]

[Footnote 436: 'And that you may see how very small a part one firmament is of the whole sum of things, how small a fraction it is, not even so much in proportion as a single man is to the whole earth.'--vi. 650-52.]

[Footnote 437: 'And traversed the whole boundless region of space, in mind and spirit.'--i. 74.]

[Footnote 438: 'Who can order the infinite mass? who can hold with a guiding hand the mighty reins of immensity?'--ii. 1095-96.]

[Footnote 439: ii. 16.]

[Footnote 440: ii. 348.]

[Footnote 441: i. 28.]

[Footnote 442: Lucretius, in other places where he introduces pictures or stories from the ancient mythology, as at ii. 600, etc., iii. 978, etc., iv. 584, etc., treats them as symbolising some facts of Nature or human life. Occasionally, as at v. 14, etc., he deals with them in the spirit of Euhemerism. He never uses them, as Virgil, Horace, or Ovid do, merely as materials for artistic representation.]

[Footnote 443: iii. 23.]

[Footnote 444: v. 233-4.]

[Footnote 445: ii. 931, etc.]

[Footnote 446: v. 1233-5.]