Apuleius: DE DOGMATE PLATONIS

Consideranti mihi et diligentius intuenti, et saepe alias, Faustine fili? virtutis indagatrix expultrixque vitiorum, divinarum particeps rerum philosophia videbatur, et nunc maxime, cum naturae interpretationem et remotarum ab oculis rerum investigationem sibi vindicet. Nam cum ceteri magnitudine rei territi, eiusmodi laborem arduum et profundum existimarent, sola philosophia suum non despexit ingenium, nec indignam se existimavit, cui divinarum et humanarum rerum disc[r]eptatio deferatur; sed concinere (addicere) tam bonas artes et eiusmodi operam cum ingenuitate professionis suae credidit, et congruere istius modi curam talibus studiis et moribus.

As I considered and looked more carefully, and often at other times as well, Faustine, my son? philosophy seemed to me the investigator of virtue and the expeller of vices, a participant in divine matters—and now most of all, since it claims for itself the interpretation of nature and the investigation of things removed from the eyes. For while the rest, frightened by the magnitude of the matter, judged a labor of this kind arduous and profound, philosophy alone did not disdain its own genius, nor did it deem itself unworthy that the disceptation of divine and human things be referred to it; rather, it believed it fitting to harmonize (to dedicate) such good arts and such effort with the ingenuousness of its profession, and that a care of this sort is congruent with such studies and morals.

Nam cum mundum homines eiusque penetralia corpore adire non possent, ut terreno domicilio relicto illas regiones inspicerent, philosophiam ducem nancti eiusque inventis inbuti, animo peregrinari ausi sunt per caeli plagas, his itineribus quae exploratione acuminis sui pervia sapientiae solis cogitationibus viderant, ut, cum ipsius intervalli condicione a mundi vicinia natura nos secretos esse voluisset, inmensitati tamen eius volucrique curriculo cogitationum nostrarum nos pernicitas intimaret; facillimeque ea, de quibus origo eius est, anima divinis suis oculis aspexit, agnovit, aliis etiam eius scientiam tradidit, veluti prophetae quidam deorum maiestate conpleti effantur ceteris, quae divini beneficio soli vident. Quare et eos, qui unius loci ingenia nobis qualitatesque describunt, aut moenia urbis aut alicuius amnis fluenta aut amoenitates et magnitudines montium, alia multa descripta ab aliis, plerique studiose legunt: Nysae iuga et penetralia Corcyci, et Olympi sacra, et Ossae ardua, alia huiuscemodi sola dumtaxat et singula extollunt. Quorum me miseret, cum tanto opere nec magnis et oppido paucis inexplebili admiratione capiuntur.

For since men could not with the body approach the world and its inner sanctums, so as, their earthly domicile having been left behind, to inspect those regions, having found philosophy as their guide and being imbued with her discoveries, they dared to travel in spirit through the tracts of heaven, by those journeys which, through the reconnaissance of their own acumen, they had seen to be passable to wisdom by thoughts alone; so that, although by the very condition of the interval nature had willed us to be kept apart from the neighborhood of the world, nevertheless the swiftness of our thoughts would intimate to us its immensity and winged course. And most easily did the soul, with its divine eyes, behold those things from which is its origin, recognized it, and even handed down its knowledge to others, just as certain prophets, filled with the majesty of the gods, utter to the rest the things which by divine beneficence they alone see. Wherefore even those who describe for us the characters and qualities of a single place, or the walls of a city or the flowings of some river or the charms and magnitudes of mountains—many other things too described by others—are diligently read by the majority: the ridges of Nysa and the innermost recesses of Corycus, and the sacred places of Olympus, and the steep heights of Ossa—others of this kind they extol only and each by itself. I pity such people, since with so great an exertion they are captivated with an insatiable admiration for things that are not great and indeed are exceedingly few.

Hoc illis evenire adeo non est mirabile, cum nihil maius suspexerint neque ad aliquid intenderint, quod maiore diligentia contemplandum esset. Ceterum si terrarum orbem omnemque mundum contemplari pariter aliquando potuissent, minus exiguas eius et singulas partes dignas laudibus credidissent, quibus esset universitas conprehensa. Quare nos Aristotelen prudentissimum et doctissimum philosophorum et Theophrastum auctorem secuti, quantum possumus cogitatione contingere, dicemus de omni hac caelesti ratione, naturasque et officia conplexi et cur et quemadmodum moveantur explicabimus.

That this should happen to them is not at all marvelous, since they have looked up to nothing greater nor directed themselves toward anything that ought to be contemplated with greater diligence. But if ever they had been able at once to contemplate the circle of lands and the whole world, they would have judged its slight and single parts less worthy of praises, though by them the universality is comprehended. Wherefore we, following Aristotle, the most prudent and most learned of the philosophers, and taking Theophrastus as our author, so far as we can touch by thought, will speak about this whole celestial rationale, and, having embraced the natures and offices, we shall explain why and how they are moved.

I. Mundus omnis societate caeli et terrae constat et eorum natura quae utriusque sunt; vel sic: mundus est ornata ordinatio dei munere, deorum recta custodia. Cuius cardinem — sic enim dixerim kentron — robustum et inmobilem genetrix atque altrix animantium omnium habet tellus, supernis omnibus, ut videri potest, aeris liquiditate ad modum tegminis saeptis et opertis. Vltra deorum domus est, quod caelum vocamus: quod quidem divinis corporibus onustum videmus, pulcherrimis ignibus et perlucidis solis et lunae reliquorumque siderum, cum quibus fertur per orbem dierum noctiumque curriculis, agens et stellarum choros intermino lapsu, finem nulla aevi defectione factura.

1. The whole world consists by the association of heaven and earth and of the nature of those things which are of both; or thus: the world is an adorned ordination by the gift of God, the upright custody of the gods. Its pivot—so I would say, the kentron—robust and immovable, the earth holds, the mother and nurse of all living beings, while all things above, as can be seen, are enclosed and covered by the liquidity of air in the manner of a covering. Beyond is the house of the gods, which we call the heaven: which indeed we see laden with divine bodies, with most beautiful fires and the pellucid lights of the sun and the moon and of the remaining stars, with which it is borne through the orb in the courses of days and nights, and conducts the choruses of the stars with an interminable glide, destined to make no end through any failure of age.

Sed cum omne caelum ita revolvatur ut sphaera, eam tamen radicibus oportet teneri, quas divina machinatio verticibus adfixit, ut in tornando artifex solet forcipe materiam conprehensam reciproco volumine rotundare; eos polos dicimus, a quibus, veluti a cardinibus, directio quaedam profecta axis est dictus, divisor et disterminator mundi, orbem terrae in medietate constituens. Verum hi vertices, quos inmobiles diximus, ita sunt ut supra caput alter adpareat ex parte boreae, qui septemtrionalis vocatur; alter antarcticus humo tegitur, umidus et austrinis vaporibus mollis. Sed caelum ipsum stellaeque caeligenae omnisque siderea conpago aether[a] vocatur, non, ut quidam putant, quod ignitus sit et incensus, sed quod cursibus rapidis semper rotetur, elementum non unum ex quattuor quae nota sunt cunctis, sed longe aliud, numero quintum, primum ordine, genere divinum et inviolabile.

But although the whole heaven is revolved like a sphere, nevertheless it must be held by roots, which a divine contrivance has affixed at the vertices, just as in turning on a lathe the craftsman is accustomed to round the material grasped by the forceps with a reciprocal revolution; these we call the poles, from which, as from hinges, a certain line of direction proceeds, called the axis, the divider and demarcator of the world, setting the orb of the earth in the middle. In truth these vertices, which we have called immobile, are such that one appears above the head on the side of Boreas, which is called the Septentrional; the other, the Antarctic, is covered by earth, moist and soft with Austral vapors. But the heaven itself and the stars heaven-born and the whole sidereal framework are called the aether, not, as some think, because it is fiery and inflamed, but because it is always rotated with rapid courses, an element not one of the four that are known to all, but far other, fifth in number, first in order, in kind divine and inviolable.

II. Iam astrorum innumerabilis multitudo partim labitur cum orbis inerrantis regione, quam circulus ambit signifer, obliqua conplexione circumdatus, et signis XII inluminatus, partim errantibus stellis, quae neque priorum motus habent neque sane inter se similes et aequales, sed adfixae diversis globis inordinatum, ut sic dixerim, ordinem servant; aliaeque ultra sunt, aliae citra. Stellae, quae propter naturam eiusmodi nullis creduntur erroribus vagae, et infinitos numero greges ducunt et simplex aetheris dorsum alma et sacrata amoenitate lucis coronant. Septem vero deorum nominibus inlustres, totidem orbibus adfixae sunt et gradatim sibimet superlatae, ut superior inferiore sit maior, ac vicissim mutuis adhaesionibus nexae conplexu illius orbis, qui inerrabilis dicitur, continentur.

2. Already the innumerable multitude of the stars partly glides in the region of the unerring orb, which the sign-bearing circle encompasses, surrounded by an oblique complexure and illumined with 12 signs, partly with the wandering stars, which have neither the motions of the former nor indeed among themselves similar and equal ones, but, affixed to diverse globes, observe, so to speak, a disordered order; and some are beyond, others on this side. The stars which, by a nature of this sort, are believed to be subject to no errancies both lead flocks without number and crown the simple back of the aether with kindly and hallowed pleasantness of light. But the seven, illustrious with the names of the gods, are affixed to as many orbs and by degrees set one above another, so that the higher is greater than the lower; and, in turn, knit by mutual adhesions, they are contained by the complex of that orb which is called unerring.

Hic Phaenonis globus, quem appellamus Saturnum; post quem Phaethontis secundus est, quem Iovem dicimus: et loco tertio Pyrois, quam multi Herculis, plures Martis stellam vocant. Stilbon, cui quidam Apollinis, ceteri Mercuri nomen dederunt. Quintus Phosphorus, Iunonia, immo Veneris stella censetur.

Here is the orb of Phaenon, which we call Saturn; after which comes the second, of Phaethon, which we call Jove: and in the third place Pyroeis, which many call the star of Hercules, more the star of Mars. Stilbon, to which some have given the name of Apollo, the rest of Mercury. The fifth, Phosphorus, is reckoned Juno’s—nay rather, Venus’s star.

Deinde lolis est orbis et ultima omnium luna, altitudinis aetheriae principia disterminans, quae divinas et inmortales vivacitates ignium pascens, ordinatis ac semper aequalibus invectionibus solvitur atque reparatur.

Then there is the orb of the Sun, and last of all the Moon, demarcating the bounds of ethereal height, which, feeding the divine and immortal vivacities of the fires, is dissolved and renewed by ordered and ever equal approaches.

III. Post eam vero partem, quae sancti aetheris finibus coercetur, cuius mensa pensaque distinctio est et natura inmutabilis, regio est mortalis ac iam paene terrena, cuius primae sunt partes tenuiores et vaporatae, quippe cum finitimis aetheris adtingantur ardoribus, quantum maximis parva et quantum rapidis possunt pigriora contingi. Sed ex ea parte, quae curriculis finitimi inuritur solis, se iaculari atque emicare et scintillare flammae quaedam ostensae oculis nostris videntur, quas Graeci cometas et docidas et bothynos appellant quasque labi et fluere frequenter videmus, lucere facile faciliusque restingui. Exin inferioris aeris qualitas turbidior infunditur, cui permixtus est glacialis rigor; sed superioris vicinia claritatis et propinqui caloris adflatu nitescit ac sinceriore interdum luce vestitur.

III. After that part, indeed, which is restrained by the limits of the holy aether—whose division is measured and weighed, and whose nature is immutable—there is a region that is mortal and now almost terrestrial, whose first parts are thinner and vaporous, since they are touched by the ardors of the neighboring aether, in so far as small things by the greatest, and as the more sluggish can be touched by the more rapid. But from that part which is seared by the courses of the adjoining sun, certain flames, presented to our eyes, seem to hurl themselves, to dart forth, and to scintillate—those which the Greeks call comets and docidas and bothynos—and which we often see to glide and to flow, to shine easily, and more easily to be extinguished. Then the quality of the lower air, more turbid, is infused, in which a glacial rigor is mixed; but by the neighborhood of the superior brightness and by the afflation of the near heat it gleams and is sometimes clothed with a more sincere light.

Huius saepe mutabilis convertitur species, cum sit natura vitiabili: et in nubes cogitur et reciprocis flabris aperitur et nimbis vehementibus rumpitur, nivibus etiam et glacie inhorrescit et praecipiti grandique desuper verberatur; turbinum flatibus typhonumque conflictu fit procellosa, sed telis fulminum et missilium caelestium iaculis ignescit.

Its appearance is often changed, since it is of a corruptible nature: it is gathered into clouds and is opened by reciprocating blasts, and is broken by vehement rain-clouds; it also bristles with snows and ice and is beaten from above by headlong and heavy hail; by the blasts of whirlwinds and the clash of typhoons it becomes tempestuous, but by the darts of thunderbolts and the javelins of celestial missiles it is set aflame.

IV. Aeri terra coniungitur eaque in se suscipit maria. Haec frequentatur animantibus, haec silvarum viriditate vestitur, haec perennitate recreatur, haec fluminum frigidos lapsus nunc erroribus terrenis vehit, modo profundo in mari confundit; eadem infinitis coloribus floret, altitudine montium, camporum aequore, nemorum opacitate variatur, sinuosis inflexa litoribus, distincta insulis, villuis urbibusque conlucens, quas sapiens genus, homo communibus usibus fabricatur. Nec sum nescius, plerosque huius operis auctores terrarum orbem ita divisisse: partem eius insulas esse, partem vero continentem vocavere, nescii omnem hanc terrenam inmensitatem Atlantici maris ambitu coerceri insulamque hanc unam esse cum insulis suis omnibus.

4. To the air the earth is joined, and it receives the seas into itself. This is frequented by animate beings, this is clothed with the verdure of forests, this is refreshed by perennity; this carries the cold courses of rivers, now bearing them in terrestrial wanderings, now confounding them in the deep in the sea; the same flourishes with infinite colors, is varied by the loftiness of mountains, by the level surface of plains, by the opacity of groves, bent with sinuous shores, marked off by islands, shining together with villas and cities, which the wise race, man, fashions for common uses. Nor am I unaware that most authors of this work have thus divided the orb of lands: that part of it are islands, but part they have called the continent, not knowing that all this terrestrial immensity is constrained by the circuit of the Atlantic Sea, and that this one is an island together with all its islands.

Nam similes huic alias maiores et alias minores circumfundit Oceanus, quae tamen merito videntur ignotae, cum ne hanc quidem, cuius cultore sumus, omnem peragrare possimus. Nam sicut hae insulae interfluuntur, quae sunt in nostro mari, ita illae in universo salo fretis latioribus ambiuntur.

For the Ocean surrounds others similar to this, some larger and others smaller, which nevertheless rightly seem unknown, since not even this one, whose cultivators we are, are we able to traverse entirely. For just as these islands which are in our sea are interflowed, so those in the universal brine are surrounded by broader straits.

V. Elementorum inter se mutui nexus artis adfinitatibus inplicantur, et quinque coniuges copulae his ordinatae vicibus adtinentur, ut adhaereant et gravioribus leviora: aquam in se habet tellus aut aqua, ut alii putant, vehit teram; aer ex aqua gignitur, ignis aeria densitate conflatur; aether vicissim ignesque illi inmortalis dei vivacitate flammantur. Huius divini ignis origine incensi per totius mundi convexa inlustribus facibus ignescunt. Superna quapropter dii superi sedes habent, infima ceterorum animantium terrena possident genera, per quae serpunt et erumpunt et scatent flumina, fontes et maria, quae meatus et lacunas et origines habent in gremio terrarum.

5. The mutual bonds of the elements among themselves are entwined by affinities of art, and five conjugal couplings, ordered in their turns, pertain to these, so that the lighter adhere to the heavier: the earth holds water within itself, or the water, as others think, conveys the earth; air is begotten from water, fire is fused from airy density; aether in turn, and those fires, are enflamed by the vivacity of the immortal god. Kindled by the origin of this divine fire, through the convexities of the whole world they blaze with shining torches. Wherefore the gods above have their seats in the supernal regions, the lowest earthly kinds of the other living beings possess the nether parts, through which rivers, springs, and seas creep, burst forth, and gush, which have channels and pools and sources in the bosom of the lands.

Ipsarum vero insularum, quae sunt in nostro mari, digna memoratu Trinacria est, Euboea, Cypros, Cyrnos atque Sardinia, Creta, Peloponnesos, Lesbos: minores autem aliae, ut naevuli quidam, per apertas ponti sunt sparsae regiones, aliae Cyclades dictae, quae frequentioribus molibus adluuntur.

Of the islands themselves, which are in our sea, worthy of mention are Trinacria, Euboea, Cyprus, Cyrnos and Sardinia, Crete, the Peloponnese, Lesbos: but there are other smaller ones, like certain little naevi (beauty-spots), scattered through the open regions of the sea; others are called the Cyclades, which are washed by more frequent surges.

VI. Maria maiora sunt Oceanus et Atlanticum, quibus orbis nostri terminantur anfractus. Sed occiduarum partium mare per angustias oris artatum in artissimos sinus funditur et rursus a Columnis Herculis refusum, in inmensam latitudinem panditur, saepiusque coeuntibus terris, veluti quibusdam fretorum cervicibus, premitur et idem rursus cedentibus est terris inmensum. Primum igitur a Columnis navigantibus dextrum latus duobus sinibus maximis cingitur, quorum primus duas Syrtes habet, alter inparibus quidem sinuatur figuris, sed in maxima divisus est maria, quorum unum Gallicum dicitur, alterum Africum, quod quidem Aristoteles Sardiniense maluit dicere, tertium Adriaticum pelagus.

6. The greater seas are the Ocean and the Atlantic, by which the windings of our orb are bounded. But the sea of the western parts, narrowed through the narrows of the mouth, is poured into the very tight bays, and again, driven back from the Pillars of Hercules, it spreads out into immense breadth; and, with the lands more often coming together, as if by certain necks of straits, it is pressed, and the same, with the lands again receding, is immense. Therefore, for those sailing from the Pillars, the right-hand side is girdled by two very great bays, the first of which has the two Syrtes; the other is indeed indented with unequal figures, but is divided into the greatest seas, of which one is called the Gallic, the other the African, which indeed Aristotle preferred to call the Sardinian, the third the Adriatic deep.

His iungitur Siculum et post Creticum, eo indiscretis finibus Pamphylium, Assyrium, Aegyptium. Sed ante Aegaea et Myrtoa sunt maria. His sane vicinus est Pontus, sinus amplissimus maris nostri, cuius extremus recessus in Maeotim senescit; ex Hellesponti fonte concipitur vestibulumque eius Proponti(u)s vocatur.

To these is joined the Sicilian, and after it the Cretan; to this, with indistinct boundaries, the Pamphylian, the Assyrian, the Egyptian. But before these are the Aegean and Myrtoan seas. Neighbor to these, indeed, is the Pontus, the most ample gulf of our sea, whose farthest recess wanes into the Maeotis; it is conceived from the source of the Hellespont, and its vestibule is called the Propontis.

Ab ortu solis Oceanus est, Indicum et Persicum mare conferens. Hinc patescunt finitima Rubri maris, quae per angustas longinquasque faucis in Hyrcanium et Caspium flectuntur sinus, ultraque profundae vastitatis esse maria creduntur. Deinde paulatim Scythicum et Hibernium freta, et rursum mare, per quod Gallicum sinum atque Gaditanas Columnas circumvectus Oceanus orbis nostri metas includit.

From the rising of the sun there is the Ocean, conjoining the Indian and Persian seas. From here the neighboring parts of the Red Sea open out, which, through narrow and far-stretching straits, are bent into the Hyrcanian and Caspian gulfs, and beyond are believed to be seas of profound vastness. Then, little by little, the Scythian and Hibernian straits, and again the sea, through which, having circumnavigated the Gallic Gulf and the Gaditanian Columns, the Ocean encloses the bounds of our world.

VII. Sed in altera parte orbis iacent insularum aggeres maximarum, Britanniae duae, et Labeon et Hibernia, iis quas supra diximus [esse] maiores. Verum hae in Celtarum finibus sitae. Sunt minores vero ultra Indos, Probane atque Loxe.

7. But in the other part of the world lie masses of the greatest islands, the two Britains, and Labeon and Hibernia, greater than those which we mentioned above. Yet these are situated within the bounds of the Celts. There are smaller ones indeed beyond the Indians, Probane and Loxe.

Multaeque aliae, orbis ad modum sparsae, hanc nostram insulam [id est hunc terrarum orbem], quam maximam diximus, ornamentis suis pingunt et continuatione ut quibusdam sertis coronant. At enim huius terrae, quam nos colimus, latitudo XL, prolixitas LXX milia stadiorum tenet. Sed in divisione terrarum orbis Asiam et Europam et cum his vel, sicut plures, praeterea Africam accepimus.

And many others as well, scattered after the manner of the orb, adorn this our island [that is, this orb of lands], which we said is the greatest, with their own ornaments, and by continuity, as with certain garlands, they crown it. But indeed the breadth of this land, which we cultivate, holds 40, the length 70 thousand stadia. Yet in the division of the lands of the orb we have received Asia and Europe, and with these—or, as more [say], besides—Africa.

Europa ab Herculis columnis usque Ponticum et Hyrcanium mare ac flumen Tanain fines habet, Asia ab isdem angustiis Pontici maris usque ad alias angustias, quae inter Arabicum sinum et interioris ambitum pelagi iacent, constringiturque Oceani cingulo et societate nostri maris. Sed alii alio modo, ut quidam ab exordio Tanais ad ora Nili Asiae terminos metiuntur. Africam vero ab isthmo Rubri maris vel ab ipsi fontibus Nili oriri putandum eiusque in Gaditanis locis fines esse.

Europe has its boundaries from the Pillars of Hercules up to the Pontic and Hyrcanian Sea and the river Tanais; Asia, from the same narrows of the Pontic Sea up to the other narrows which lie between the Arabian Gulf and the inner circuit of the sea, and it is constrained by the girdle of the Ocean and by association with our sea. But others define it otherwise, as some measure the termini of Asia from the beginning of the Tanais to the shores of the Nile. Africa, for its part, is to be thought to arise from the isthmus of the Red Sea or from the very sources of the Nile, and to have its bounds in the Gaditan locales.

Sed ipsam Aegyptum plerique Asiae, plures Africae adiungunt, ut insularum situs sunt qui cum finitimis locis conprehendunt et sunt qui in alia divisione eas habendas putant. De mari satis dictum.

But Egypt itself, most adjoin to Asia, more to Africa; as to the situation of islands, there are those who comprehend them with neighboring places, and there are those who think they ought to be held in another division. Concerning the sea, enough has been said.

VIII. Terreni vero casus ita se habent. Exhalationes duas physici esse dicunt: tenues et frequentes vixque visibilis ad superiora minari ex gremio telluris, nebularum agmina halitu amnium fontiumque constare, matutinis temporibus crassiora. Harum altera arida est atque fumo consimilis, quae terrenis eructationibus surgit, altera umida et egelida; hanc ex fluentis superioris vaporis natura ad se trahit; et ex hac quidem nebulae, rores, pruinae, nubila et imbres, nix atque grando generantur; de illa superiore, quam diximus siccam, venti, animae atque flamina et fulmina atque aliae ignitorum telorum gignuntur plurimae species.

8. But terrestrial phenomena stand thus. Physici say there are two exhalations: thin and frequent, and scarcely visible, mounting toward the upper regions from the bosom of the earth; the battalions of mists consist of the breath of rivers and springs, thicker at morning times. Of these, one is dry and similar to smoke, which rises from earthly eructations; the other is moist and cool: this the nature of the higher vapor draws to itself from the outflowings; and from this indeed are generated mists, dews, rime, clouds and rains, snow and hail; from that other, higher one, which we said is dry, winds, breaths and blasts and lightning, and very many other species of fiery missiles, are begotten.

Nebula constat aut ex ortu nubeculae aut ex eius reliquiis; est autem exhalatio vaporata et umore viduata, aere crassior, nube subtilior, cui serenitas abolitionem infert. Nec aliud est serenitas, quam aer purgatus caligine et perspicue sincerus. Ros vero nocturnus umor est, quem tenuiter serenitas spargit.

Mist consists either from the rise of a little cloud or from its remnants; it is, moreover, a vaporized exhalation and bereft of moisture, thicker than air, subtler than a cloud, upon which serenity brings abolition. Nor is serenity anything other than air purged of haze and transparently pure. Dew, for its part, is a nocturnal moisture, which serenity finely scatters.

IX. Glaciem dicimus umorem sereno rigore concretum. Huic est pruina consimilis, si mollitia roris matutinis frigoribus incanuit. Ergo aer actus in nubem nubilum denset et ea crassitudo aquarum fetu gravidatur.

9. We call ice moisture congealed by serene rigor. To this rime is similar, if the softness of dew has turned hoary in the morning chills. Therefore the air, driven into a cloud, condenses a cloudiness, and that thickness is made gravid with the brood of waters.

Imber exprimitur, cum inter se urguentur nubium densitates; totque diversitatibus pluviae cadunt, quot modis aer nubili condicionibus cogitur. Raritas enim nubium stillicida dispergit, quae concretae vehementius effundunt agmina largiora et eas aquas, quas imbres vocamus, a quibus hoc differunt nimbi, quod imber pluvia iugis est, nimbus autem quanto repentinus est, tanto vehementior, et quanto improvisior praecipitatio eius est, tanto breviore casu restringitur. Nives autem colligi iactatione densarum nubium constat; nam priusquam in aquam defluant, fractae ac discissae spumas agitationibus suis faciunt et mox gelatus umor rigore frigoris inhorrescit.

Rain is pressed out when the densities of the clouds are forced together; and rains fall with as many diversities as the air is constrained by the conditions of cloudiness. For the rarity of the clouds scatters the drippings, whereas condensed clouds pour out more vehemently larger masses, and those waters which we call rains; from which nimbus-clouds differ in this, that an imber is continuous rainfall, but a nimbus, the more sudden it is, the more vehement it is, and the more unanticipated its precipitation is, by so much is it confined to a briefer fall. Moreover, it is agreed that snows are gathered by the tossing of dense clouds; for before they flow down into water, being broken and torn apart, they make foams by their own agitations, and soon the frozen moisture shudders stiff with the rigor of the cold.

Haec cum, victis nubibus, crebrior ad terram venit, eam nos tempestatem ningorem vocamus. Grandinare vero tunc dicimus, cum aqua nubem lapidoso pondere et festinante perrumpit eademque vi et ad pernicitatem incitata et, cedente aeris molli liquore, praecipitata(m) indignatione vehementi humum verberat.

When this, with the clouds conquered, comes more thickly to the earth, we call that storm a snowstorm. But we say it is hailing when water bursts through the cloud with stony weight and in haste, and, incited by the same force also unto celerity, and with the soft liquid of the air yielding, being precipitated it with vehement indignation lashes the ground.

X. Haec sat erit de iis quae udis elementis aquosisque contingunt. Verum aliae sunt passiones, cum impulsu frigidioris aeris venti generantur.Nec enim aliud est nisi multum et vehemens in unum coacti aeris flumen. Hunc spiritum dicimus,licet spiritus ille etiam nominetur, qui animalia extrinsecus omnia (vitalia) tractus suis vitali et fecunda ope vegetat.

X. This will be enough about those things which pertain to the wet and watery elements. But there are other affections, when by the impulse of colder air winds are generated.For it is nothing else than a great and vehement stream of air coacted into one. We call this spirit,although that is also named spirit which, from without, by its draughts, with vital and fruitful help, quickens all (vital) animals.

Siccos et superioris mundi flatus ventos nominamus, auras vero umidos spiritus. Sed ventorum binae sunt species. Qui facti e telluris halitu constant, terrigenae nuncupantur; at illi qui excutiuntur e sinibus enkolpiai graece sunt nominati.

We name the dry blasts and those of the upper world “winds,” but “breezes” truly are moist breaths. Yet there are two species of winds: those made from the earth’s exhalation (halitus) and consisting of it are called earth-born; but those that are shaken out from the bosoms (bays) are, in Greek, named “enkolpiai.”

Consimiles his haberi oportet eos qui de fluminibus, lacubus et stagnis vel ruptis nubibus per aperta caeli manare adsolent, rursumque in crassam nubium speciem conglobantur, vel cum imber effusus concient flabra, quae exydriai Atticorum lingua vocitantur.

Those must be considered similar to these which are wont to flow out from rivers, lakes, and pools, or, when the clouds are broken, to stream through the open spaces of the sky, and in turn are massed into a thick form of clouds; or when a poured-out rain stirs up blasts, which in the Attic tongue are called “exydriai.”

XI. Nunc nomina exsequemur regionesque ventorum. Euros oriens, boreas septemtrio, occidens Zephyros, austros medius dies mittit. Hos quattuor ventos alii plures interfl[u]ant.

11. Now we will set forth the names and the regions of the winds. The East sends the Eurus, the North (Septentrion) the Boreas, the West the Zephyrs, Midday (the South) sends the Austers. Between these four winds several others blow.

Nam quamvis eurus sit ventus orientis, idem tamen aparctias accipit[ur] nomen, cum eum oriens aestivus effundit; apeliotes autem vocatur, cum aequidianis exortibus procreatur; eurus est, quando hiemalis ortus portis emittitur. Zephyrus vero, quem Romana lingua favonium novit, hic cum de aestivis occiduis partibus surgit, iapygis nomine cieri solet; at ille qui propior est aequinoctiali plagae ... (notus) et quia, qui VII stellarum regione generatur, et huic vicinus est aparctias; hic (propior est) ... ad diem medium. Thrascias et argestes: sunt indidem flantes.

For although eurus is the wind of the east, nevertheless it takes the name aparctias when the summer east pours it forth; but it is called apeliotes when it is generated at the equinoctial risings; it is eurus when it is sent out from the gates of the winter rising. Zephyrus, however, which the Roman tongue knows as favonium—when it rises from the summer-setting parts, it is wont to be summoned by the name iapygis; but that one which is nearer to the equinoctial zone ... (notus) and because the one that is generated in the region of the 7 stars, and aparctias is near to this one; this one (is nearer) ... to mid-day. Thrascias and argestes: they are blowing from the same place.

Austrorum in nominibus illa est observata diversitas; namque cum de abscondito polo flatus adveniunt, notus est, euronotus ille qui inter notum atque eurum medius effringit, ex alio latere libonotus e duobus unum facit.

In the names of the Austers (south winds) this diversity is observed; for when blasts come from the hidden pole, it is Notus; Euronotus is that one which, midway between Notus and Eurus, breaks out; from the other side Libonotus makes one out of two.

XII. Excursores venti habentur, qui directo spiritu proflant;flabris reciprocis caecias putatur esse. Et quidam hiemales habentur, ut noti; etesiae frequentiores sunt aestate, animis septemtrionis ac zephyri temperatis. Veris ornithiae venti appellantur, aquilonum genus ex aere prosati, minore nisu, nec iugi perseverantia spiritus perferentes.

12. Forerunning winds are held to be those which blow with a direct breath;with reciprocal blasts the Caecias is thought to be. And some are reckoned hiemal, such as the Noti; the Etesians are more frequent in summer, their spirits tempered by the Septentrio and Zephyrus. Of spring the winds called Ornithiae are so named, a kind of Aquilones begotten from the air, with lesser effort, nor sustaining a continuous perseverance of breath.

At enim procellosus flatus cataegis dicitur, quem praefractum possumus dicere, ventus qui, de superiore caeli parte submissus, inferiora repentinis inpulsibus quatiat. Turbo autem dicitur, qui repentinis flabris prosilit atque universa perturbat. Vertex ille est vel, uti dicitur, pinea(s), cum torquetur humus arida et ab infimo erigitur ad summum.

But indeed the stormy blast is called cataegis, which we can call “abrupt,” a wind which, sent down from the upper part of the sky, shakes the lower regions with sudden impulses. But it is called a whirlwind (turbo), which leaps forth with sudden gusts and perturbs all things. That is a vortex, or, as it is said, “pinea(s),” when the dry ground is twisted and is raised from the lowest to the highest.

Anaphysemata Graeci vocant eos spiritus, qui de fundo vel hiatibus terrae explosi ad superna minari solent. Hi cum maiore vi torti sunt, fit procella terrestris; a Graecis prester nomen accepit. Sed cum tormentum illud ire pergit densasque et (t)umidas nubes prae se agit coactasque collidit, fit sonitus et intonat caelum, non secus ac si commotum ventis mare cum ingenti fragore undas litoribus inpingat.

Anaphysemata the Greeks call those breaths which, having blown out from the bottom or from the gaping clefts of the earth, are wont to menace upward. When these are twisted with greater force, a terrestrial squall arises; it has received from the Greeks the name prester. But when that tormentum goes on its way and drives before it thick and swollen clouds and dashes together those compressed, there is a crash and the sky thunders, not otherwise than if the sea, set in motion by winds, with immense din were to hurl its waves against the shores.

XIII. At Favorinus, non ignobilis sapiens, halec de ventis refert: quattuor mundi plagas inparem numerum habere ventorum, eo quod ortus et occasus mutentur terna vice cum solis accessu, meridies et arctos isdem semper regionibus sint notatae. Ortus quippe accepimus aequinoctialem et solstitialem et brumalem, quibus occasus redduntur eadem intervallorum fratione conversa(e). Eurus igitur aequinoctialis orientis est ventus nec invenusta nominis eius fictio est, qui sit apo tes heoias rheon. Idem apheliotes a Graecis, subsolanus a nostris solet dici.

13. But Favorinus, a not ignoble sage, reports these things about the winds: the four regions of the world have an odd number of winds, because the risings and settings are changed in a threefold turn with the sun’s approach, while the south and the Arctos are always marked in the same regions. For we have received three risings—the equinoctial, the solstitial, and the brumal—to which the settings are rendered by the same fraction of intervals reversed (convers(a)e). Therefore Eurus is the wind of the equinoctial east, nor is the derivation of its name ungraceful, that it is “flowing from the dawn” (apo tes heoias rheon). The same is wont to be called Apheliotes by the Greeks, Subsolanus by our people.

Sed qui ab aestiva solstitiali(s) orientis meta venit, boreas graece, latine aquilo nominantur; hunc aithregenen quod sit alias serenus, Homerus ait; borean vero apo tes boes quod non sine clamore soleat intonare. Tertium ventum, qui ab oriente hiberno venit, Graeci euronoton vocant. Item occidui sunt tres: caurus, qui graece argestes vocatur, is est adversus aquiloni; item favonius, Zephiros euro contrarius; tertius africus, lips, vulturno reflat.

But the one that comes from the summer, solstitial goal-mark of the east is named in Greek Boreas, in Latin Aquilo; Homer says this one is aithregenes, because at other times it is serene; and Boreas from apo tes boes, because it is wont to thunder not without a clamor. The third wind, which comes from the winter east, the Greeks call Euronoton. Likewise there are three of the west: Caurus, which in Greek is called Argestes—this is opposed to Aquilo; likewise Favonius, Zephyros, contrary to Eurus; the third Africus, Lips, blows back against Vulturnus.

Meridies vero, quoniam eadem semper regione signatur, uno austro, id est notoi, flatur ... et is septemtrio habet cognomentum, qui tamen graecma lingua aparktias dictus est.

Midday, however, since it is always marked in the same region, is blown by one Auster, that is, Notos, ... and the North has the cognomen Septentrio, which nevertheless in the Greek language is called Aparktias.

XIV. Horum nomina plerique commutant de loco vel similitudine aliqua, ut Galli circium appellant a turbine eius et vertice, Apuli iapyga ventum ex Iapygiae sinu, id est ex ipso Gargano venientem. Hunc caurum esse manifestum; nam et ex occiduo venit et Vergilius eius sic meminit: Illam inter caedes pallentem morte futura fecerat Ignipotens undis et Iapyge ferri. Est etiam caecias ventus quem Aristoteles ait ad se trahere nubes et est adagium de eo tale: elkon eph'hauton hoste kaikias nephos.

14. The names of these most people change from the place or from some similarity, as the Gauls call it the circius from its whirlwind and vortex, the Apulians call the wind iapyx from the Gulf of Iapygia, that is, coming from Garganus itself. It is manifest that this is the caurus; for it too comes from the west, and Vergil thus makes mention of it: The Fire‑Powerful had made her, paling with the death to come amid the slaughters, to be borne by the waves and by the Iapyx. There is also the caecias wind, which Aristotle says draws the clouds to itself; and there is a proverb about it of this sort: drawing to itself, like the Caecias, a cloud.

Sunt etesiae et prodromi spirantes ex omni parte eo tempore aestatis, quod (de) Canis oritur. Cato autem in libris Originum non circium, sed cercium dicit. Is ventus cercius, cum loquare, buccam inplet, armatum hominem, plaustrum oneratum percellit.

There are the Etesians and the prodromi blowing from every quarter at that time of summer when the Dog rises. But Cato in the books of the Origins says not “circius,” but “cercius.” This wind Cercius, when you speak, fills the cheek, strikes down an armed man, and smites a laden wagon.

XV. Nunc de nubium praestigiis referam. Quando illa perfracta nubecula patefecerit caelum, ignescunt penetrabiles spiritus, emicatque lux clara; hoc dicitur coruscare. Et ordine quidem tonare prius oportet, postea coruscare.

15. Now I will relate about the illusions of clouds. When that little cloud, shattered, has laid open the sky, the penetrative spirits ignite, and a bright light flashes forth; this is called to coruscate. And in due order indeed, it ought to thunder first, afterwards to coruscate.

Quippe ubi nubes adflictrix ignem, ut ignifera saxa adtrita inter se, dat, obtutus velocius inlustriora contingit, auditus, dum ad aures venit, seriore sensu concipitur; ita prius coruscare caelum creditur et mox tonare; tum quod ignes, pernicitate sui claricantes, dicto citius nostrae visioni convibrant, sonus, aere verberato, alterius indicio sentitur. Flamma vero illa, quam nubium adflictus excussit, si robustiore fuerit incendio, inpetu devehitur in terras et fulminis habet nomen atque formidinem. Presteras vero nominamus, cum flammarum in illis minus fuerit.

For indeed, when a smiting cloud gives off fire—just as fire-bearing stones rubbed against one another do—the gaze more swiftly reaches the more lustrous things, while hearing, as it comes to the ears, is grasped by a slower sense; thus the sky is believed first to flash and soon after to thunder; then, because the fires, glittering by their own swiftness, quiver before our vision faster than speech, the sound, with the air beaten, is perceived by the sign of the other. But that flame which the battering of the clouds has knocked out, if it is of a stronger conflagration, is borne down upon the lands with an onrush and has the name and dread of lightning. We call them presters, however, when there is less of flames in them.

Sed si ignitum non erit fulmen, typhon vocatur. Sceptos generale omnibus quae e nubibus cadunt nomen est.

But if the thunderbolt is not fiery, it is called a typhon. Sceptos is the general name for all things that fall from the clouds.

XVI. Atque, ut breviter conprehendam cuncta generis eiusdem, eorum, quae eiusmodi praestigias humanis inferunt oculis, alia sunt quae speciem tantum spectaculi pariunt, alia quae nihil ab eo quod ostenderint mentiuntur. Fallunt imaginen irides et arcus et talia; vere videntur cometae, fulgores et similia pleraque. Irin, vulgo arcum, esse aiunt, quando imago solis vel imago lunae umidam et cavam nubem densamque ad instar speculi colorat et medietatem orbis eius secat.

XVI. And, to comprehend briefly all things of the same kind, among those which bring such illusions upon human eyes, some are those which produce only the appearance of a spectacle, others which do not in any way lie away from what they have displayed. Irides and rainbows and such things deceive the image; comets, fulgurations and most similar things are truly seen. They say the Iris, commonly the bow, exists when the image of the sun or the image of the moon colors, after the likeness of a mirror, a moist and hollow and dense cloud, and it cuts the half of its orb.

Rhabdos autem generis eiusdem ad virgae rigorem perlongum colorata nubecula dicitur. Alysis est catena quaedam luminis clarioris, per solis ambitum in se revertens. Hanc et irida illud interest, quod iris multicolora est et semicirculo figurata proculque a sole atque luna, catena clarior est, astrumque ambit orbe incolumi, corona non discolora.

Rhabdos, however, of the same kind, is called a tinted little cloud drawn out to the rigid length of a rod. Alysis is a certain chain of brighter light, returning into itself around the circuit of the sun. This differs from the iris in this: the iris is multicolored and shaped as a semicircle and is far from the sun and the moon, whereas the chain is brighter, and it encircles the star with an unimpaired orb, a crown not variegated.

Selas autem Graeci vocant incensi aeris lucem; horum pleraque iaculari credas (alia labi), stare alia. Iaculatio igitur tunc fieri putatur, cum aeris meatu atque inpulsu generatus ignis celeritate sua adlabitur cursumque rapidae festinationis ostendit. Stativa lux est, quam sterigmon illi vocant, sine cursu iugis et prolixa lux, stellaeque fluor et ignitus liquor, qui, cum latius panditur, cometes vocatur.

But the Greeks call selas the light of inflamed air; of these phenomena you would think most to dart (others to slide), others to stand. Darting, therefore, is thought then to occur when, by the movement and impulse of the air, the fire that is generated glides along by its own celerity and displays the course of rapid hastening. There is a stationary light, which they call sterigmon, without course—a continuous and prolonged light—and the star’s flux and a fiery liquor, which, when it is spread more broadly, is called a comet.

Sed plerumque luces istae repentino ortae statim occidunt; aliae autem, ut se ostenderint, aliquantisper manent. Et sunt multa eiusmodi imaginum genera, quas Graeci faces et docidas et pithos et bothynos ad eorum similitudines, unde dicta sunt, nominant; et quaedam vespertina vel matutina sunt notiora; perrara de septemtrione vel meridie videas; nihil horum quippe loci vel temporis in nascendo fidem potuit obtin[g]ere.

But for the most part these lights, having arisen suddenly, immediately disappear; others, however, once they have shown themselves, remain for a little while. And there are many kinds of images of this sort, which the Greeks name torches and docidas and pithos and bothynos, according to the resemblances from which they are so called; and certain are better known in the evening or in the morning; very rarely will you see them from the north or the south; for indeed in their arising no assurance of place or of time has been able to obtain.

XVII. De aere tantum habuimus, quod diceremus. Sed non aquarum modo tellus in se fontis habet, verum spiritu et igni fecunda est. Nam quibusdam sub terris occulti sunt spiritus et flant incendia indidem et suspirant, ut Liparae, ut Aetna, ut Vesuvius etiam noster solet.

17. We have had only so much to say about the air. But the earth not only holds within herself springs of waters, rather she is fertile with spirit and with fire. For beneath certain lands there are hidden spirits, and they blow forth conflagrations from there and suspire, as at the Liparae, as at Aetna, as even our Vesuvius is wont.

Illi etiam ignes, qui terrae secretariis continentur, praetereuntes aquas vaporant et produnt longinquitatem flammae cum tepidiores aquas reddunt, viciniam cum ferventiores opposito incendio aquae uruntur, ut Phlegethontis amnis, quem poetae [s]ciunt in fabulis inferorum. At enim illos quis non admirandos spiritus arbitretur, cum ex his animadvertat accidere, ut eorum religione lymphantes alii sine cibo potuque sint, pars vero praesagiis effantes futura? quod in oraculis Delphicis est ceterisque.

Those fires too, which are contained in the secret recesses of the earth, steam the waters they pass by and reveal the long reach of the flame when they render waters more tepid, and [they reveal] the vicinity when, with a fire set opposite, the waters are burned to greater boiling, as with the river Phlegethon, which the poets know in the fables of the underworld. But indeed who would not judge those breaths/spirits admirable, when he observes from these things that it happens that, by their constraint (religio), some, being lymphatic—raving—are without food and drink, while a part, by presages, are uttering things to come? which is the case in the Delphic oracles and the others.

Vidi et ipse apud Hierapolim Phrygiae non adeo ardui montis vicinum latus nativi oris hiatu reseratum et tenuis neque editae marginis ambitu circumdatum. Sive illa, ut poetae volunt, Ditis spiracula dicenda sunt, seu mortiferos anhelitus eos credi prior ratio est, proxima quaeque animalia et in alvum prona atque proiecta venenati spiritus contagione corripiunt et vertice circumacta(s) interimunt. Antistites denique ipsos semiviros esse, qui audeant propius accedere, ad superna semper sua ora tollentes; adeo illis cognitum est vim mali, ad inferiora aeris noxii crassitate densata, inferiores quoque facilius adire atque percellere.

I too saw at Hierapolis of Phrygia the neighboring flank of a mountain not so steep, opened by the yawning of a natural orifice and encircled by the circuit of a thin and not elevated rim. Whether those are to be called the spiracles of Dis, as the poets wish, or, if the prior reasoning is preferred, to be believed deadly exhalations, they seize whatever animals come close, cast prone upon the belly, by the contagion of the venomous breath, and kill them with the head whirled around, vertice circumacta(s). Finally, the priests themselves are half-men, who dare to approach nearer, always lifting their mouths toward the upper regions; so well is the force of the evil known to them, that lower down the noxious air, thickened in density, more easily comes at and strikes down those who are lower as well.

XVIII. Saepe accidit ut nativi spiritus, per terrae concavas partes errantes, concuterent solida terrarum, saepius ut spiritus, crescente violentia et insinuantes se telluris angustiis nec invenientes exitum, terram moverent. Horum motuum tam varia nomina quam diversi ... Namque obliquis lateribus proxima quaeque iactantes et acutis angulis mobiles epiclintae graece appellantur; sed qui subsiliunt, excutientes onera et recuperantes directis angulis, brastae vocitantur; illi, qui abstrudere videntur, hiematiae dicti(s); quorum inpulsu dissilit tellus, rhectae sunt nominati. His passionibus contigit ut quaedam terrae expirent halitus, aliae vomant saxa, nonnullae caenum; sunt quae fontes pariunt insolentibus locis, peregrinorum fluminum sulcantes vias.

18. It often happens that native spirits, wandering through the hollow parts of the earth, shake the solid parts of the lands; more often that the spirits, as their violence increases and insinuating themselves into the narrowings of the earth and not finding an exit, set the earth in motion. Of these motions the names are as various as they are different ... For those that, with slanting sides, toss everything nearby and are mobile by sharp angles are called in Greek epiclintae; but those that leap up, shaking off loads and recovering with straight angles, are called brastae; those that seem to thrust things away are called hiematiae; by whose impulse the earth splits asunder, they are named rhectae. In these sufferings it has come to pass that certain lands breathe out exhalations, others vomit stones, some mud; there are those that beget springs in unusual places, furrowing courses for peregrine rivers.

Ostae sunt motus, quibus semel solum quatitur; palmatiae vero appellantur, quorum pavitatione illa quae trepidant sine inclinationis periculo nutabunt, cum directi tamen rigoris statum retinent. Mycetias vocatur taetri odoris inquietudo terrena. Audiuntur mugitus, interioribus gemitibus expressis, cum spiritus invalidus ad terram movendam per aperta telluris inventis itineribus progreditur.

Ostae are the motions by which the ground is shaken once; palmatiae, however, are so called, in whose quivering those things that tremble will sway without danger of inclination, while nevertheless they retain a state of upright rigidity. Mycetias is the earthly disquiet of a foul odor. Bellowings are heard, with inner groans forced out, when a feeble spirit, to move the earth, advances through the openings of the earth, once pathways have been found.

XIX. His talibus marina sunt paria, cum fluctuum currentium mole nunc progressibus litora, nunc recursibus sinus caesi quatiuntur. Sentitur etiam caeli marisque cognatio, cum menstruis cursibus lunae detrimenta et accessus fretorum atque aestuum deprehenduntur. Verum enimvero ut, quatenus possum, de universitate quod sentio breviter absolvam, elementorum inter se tanta concordia est, aeris, maris atque terrae, ut admirari minus deceat, si illis eadem incommoda soleant ac secunda contingere,particulatim quidem rebus ortus atque obitus adferentia, universitatem vero a fine atque initio vindicantia.

19. The things of the sea are on a par with such, when by the mass of running currents now by the advances of the waves the shores, now by the returns the bays, cut in, are shaken. The kinship of sky and sea is also perceived, when in the monthly courses of the moon the diminutions and accessions of straits and of tides are detected. But indeed, so that, in so far as I can, I may briefly conclude what I think about the universe: there is such concord among the elements—air, sea, and earth—that it is less fitting to marvel if the same incommodities as well as favorable things are wont to befall them, bringing to individual things their births and deaths, but securing the whole against end and beginning.

Sed quibusdam mirum videri solet, quod, quum ex diversis atque inter se pugnantibus elementis mundi natura conflata sit, aridis atque fluxis, glacialibus et ignitis, tanto rerum divortio nondum sit eius mortalitas dissoluta. Quibus illud simile satisfaciet, cum in urbe ex diversis et contrariis corporata rerum inaequalium multitudo concordat; sunt enim pariter dites et egentes, adolescens aetas permixta senioribus, ignavi cum fortibus, [pessimi optimis congregati. Aut profecto quod res est fateantur, hanc esse civilis rationis admirandam temperantiam, cum quidem de pluribus una sit facta et similis sui tota, cum dissimilia membra sint (cum) receptrixque sit naturarum ad diversa tendentium fortunarumque per varias fines exitusque pergentium.

But to some it is wont to seem marvelous that, although the nature of the world has been fused from diverse and mutually-warring elements—dry and fluid, icy and fiery—yet with so great a divergence of things its dissolution into mortality has not yet come. A like example will satisfy such as these: when in a city the corporated multitude of unequal things, made up from diverse and contrary elements, is in concord; for there are equally the rich and the needy, the adolescent age mixed with elders, the slothful with the brave, [the worst congregated with the best. Or else let them confess, as the matter truly is, that this is the admirable tempering of civil reason, since indeed out of many one has been made and is wholly like unto itself, although the members are dissimilar (cum), and it is a receptacle of natures tending to different aims and of fortunes advancing through various ends and outcomes.

Et, ut res est, contrariorum per se natura amplectitur et ex dissonis fit unus idemque concentus.

And, as the fact is, the nature of contraries by itself embraces, and from dissonants one and the same harmony is made.

XX. Sic mare et femineum secus iungitur ac diversus utriusque sexus ex dissimilibus simile animal facit; artesque ipsae, naturam imitantes, ex inparibus paria faciunt: pictura ex discordibus pigmentorum coloribus, atris atque albis, luteis et puniceis, confusione modica temperatis, imagines iis quae imitatur similes facit. Ipsa etiam musica, quae de longis et brevibus, acutis et gravioribus sonis constat, tam diversis et dissonis vocibus, harmoniam consonam reddit; grammaticorum artes vide, quaeso, ut ex diversis collectae sint litteris, ex quibus aliae sunt insonae, semisonantes aliae, pars sonantes: hae tamen mutuis se auxiliis adiuvantes syllabas pariunt, et de syllabis voces. Hoc Heraclitus sententiarum suarum nebulis ab hunc modum est elocutus: Syllapsies hola kai ouch hola, sympheromenon diapheromenon, synadion diaidon; ek panton hen, kai ex henos panta.

20. Thus the male and the female sex are joined, and the distinctness of each sex makes from dissimilars a similar animal; and the arts themselves, imitating nature, make equals from unequals: painting, from the discordant colors of pigments—black and white, yellow and crimson—tempered by a moderate commixture, makes images like to those which it imitates. Music itself too, which consists of long and short, high and lower sounds, from voices so diverse and dissonant renders a consonant harmony; look, I pray, at the arts of the grammarians, how they are assembled from diverse letters, of which some are non‑sonant, others semi‑sonant, a portion sonant: yet these, aiding one another with mutual helps, beget syllables, and from syllables voices. This Heraclitus, in the mists of his sayings, expressed in this manner: Combinations—wholes and not‑wholes, the converging and the diverging, the consonant and the dissonant; from all things one, and from one all things.

XXI. Sic totius mundi substantiam, initiorum inter se inparium conventu[s], pari nec discordante consensu, natura veluti musicam temperavit; namque uvidis arida et glacialibus flammida, velocibus pigra, directis obliqua confu[n]dit unumque ex omnibus et ex uno omnia, iuxta Heraclitum, constituit. Terramque et mare et caelum solis orbe et lunae globo ceterisque orientium et conditorum siderum facibus oravit, una illa potestate mixta, quam quidem cunctis constat inplicatam, dum inconfusa, dum libera elementorum substantia, ignis, aquae, aeris, terrae, ex quibus huius sphaerae convexa et disparibus qualitatibus naturae conflata, adacta est fateri concordiam, et ex ea salutem operi machinata. Principiorum igitur consensus sibi concordiam peperit, perseverantiam vero amicitiae inter se elementis dedit specierum ipsarum aequa partitio, et dum in nullo alia ab alia vincitur, modo vel potesate.

21. Thus Nature, as if like music, has tempered the substance of the whole world by the convergence of beginnings unequal among themselves, with an equal and not discordant consensus; for indeed it blends the dry with the moist and the fiery with the icy, the swift with the slow, the straight with the oblique, and, according to Heraclitus, it established one out of all and out of one all things. And it endowed earth and sea and heaven with the orb of the sun and the globe of the moon and the torches of the other stars that rise and set, with that one power mingled which is agreed to be implicated in all things, while the substance of the elements—of fire, water, air, earth—remains unconfused, free; out of these the convexities of this sphere and Nature, fused from unequal qualities, have been driven to confess concord, and from it have engineered health for the work. Therefore the consensus of the principles has begotten concord for itself; while the equal partition of the species themselves has given to the elements among themselves the perseverance of friendship, since in nothing is one surpassed by another, in measure or in power.

Aequalis quippe omnium diversitas, gravissimorum, levissimorum, ferventium, frigidorum, docente ratione naturae, diversis licet rebus, aequalitatem deferre concordiam, concordiam omni(a) parentis mundi amoenitatem aeternitatemque repperisse.

For indeed the equal diversity of all things—the most weighty, the most light, the fervent, the frigid—Nature’s ratio instructing, although in diverse things, brings equality, concord; and concord has discovered for the world’s parent amenity and eternity.

XXII. Quid enim mundo praestantius? Lauda, quam putas, speciem: portio a te laudabitur mundi; admirare, quam voles, temperantiam, ordinationem, figuram: hic et per hunc illud quodcumque est invenietur esse laudandum. Nam quid, oro te, ornatum atque ordinatum videri potest, quod non ab ipsius exemplo imitat[ur]a sit ratio?

22. For what, indeed, is more pre-eminent than the world? Praise whatever form you think fit: a portion of the world will be praised by you; admire, as you will, the temperance, the ordination, the figure: here, and through this, whatever it is will be found to be worthy of praise. For what, I pray you, can seem ornate and orderly, which reason would not imitate from its very example?

Vnde kosmos graece nomen accepit. Euntibus sole atque luna ceteraque luce siderea per easdem vias, custoditis temporum vicibus nec ullius erroris interiectione, confusis, digeruntur tempora et rursus incipiunt pulchraeque et fecundae horae procreantur, nunc aestivos vapores revolventes, nunc pruinas hiemis circum referentes; dierum etiam noctiumque curriculis ordiuntur menses, menses texunt annos, anni seriem conficiunt saeculorum. Et hic quidem mundus magnitudine inmensus curbisus rapidus, splendore perlucidus, valenti habitudine, pubertate iuvenali (causa). Hic animalium nantium atque terrestrium, pinnigerarumque cunctarum distinxit genera, species separavit fixitque leges vivendi atque moriendi.

Whence the cosmos received its name in Greek. As the sun and the moon and the rest, with sidereal light, go along the same ways, the turns of the seasons being kept and with no interjection of any error, the times, though commingled, are set in order and begin anew, and fair and fecund hours are procreated, now revolving estival vapors, now bringing around the hoarfrosts of winter; and by the courses of days and nights months are begun, months weave years, years complete the series of ages. And this world indeed—immense in magnitude, rapid in its courses, pellucid in splendor, of valent habitude, with youthful pubescence (cause). Here it distinguished the kinds of all swimming and terrestrial animals and of the wing-bearing, separated the species, and fixed the laws of living and of dying.

Ex hoc animantia vitalis spiritus ducunt. Hinc illi statis cursibus temporum eventus, qui admirationi solent esse, cum vel ter se ventorum proelia ciuntur, vel disiectis nubibus fulminat caelum et tempestates inter se serenae hibernaeque confligunt, micant ignes, imbres rumpuntur, et rursus, placatis omnibus, amoena laetitia mundi reseratur.

From this living things draw the vital spirit. Hence, too, in the fixed courses of the times arise those events that are wont to be for admiration, when either the battles of the winds are set in motion among themselves, or, the clouds being scattered, the sky fulminates, and serene and wintry tempests clash with one another; fires flash, rains are broken open, and again, with all appeased, the pleasant joy of the world is unbarred.

XXIII. Videas et viridantibus comis caesariatam esse terram et scatebris fontium manantem, et aquarum agminibus concientem, parientem atque educantem, nec occasibus fatigari, nec saeculis anilitari, excussam erumpentibus semper tam pigris quam moventibus faecibus, aquarum saepe adluvionibus mersam, flammarum per partes voracitate consumptam. Quae tamen illi cum regionaliter videantur esse pestifera, ad omnem salvaria sunt et ad redintegrationem eius valent; et cum movetur, profecto spirat illos spiritus, quibus clausis et effugia quaerentibus moveba[n]tur, imbribus etiam madefacta non solum ad educandos fetus suos opimatur, verum etiam pestifera contagione proluitur. Flabris autem spirantium aurarum graviores et minus puri aeris spiritus differuntur atque purgantur.

23. You may also see that the earth is coiffed with green tresses and flowing with the gushings of springs, and mustering with battalions of waters, bearing and rearing, neither wearied by settings nor becoming a crone with the ages, shaken free by dregs ever bursting forth, both sluggish and moving, often submerged by inundations of waters, consumed in parts by the voracity of flames. Yet, although these things seem to her, when viewed regionally, to be pestiferous, they are salutary for the whole and avail for its reintegration; and when she is moved, she surely breathes those spirits which, when shut in and seeking outlets, set things in motion; moistened also by rains, she is not only enriched for the rearing of her offspring, but is also rinsed from pestiferous contagion. Moreover, by the blasts of breathing breezes the heavier and less pure spirits of the air are dispersed and purged.

Tepores frigus glaciale mitificant et brumalis austeritas terrestrium viscerum venas remittit. Et pars gignentium, alia adolescentium, cetera occidentium vices sustinent sorsque nascentium obitorum loco pullulat et occidentium numerus nascentibus locum pandit.

Warmth mitigates glacial cold, and brumal austerity relaxes the veins of the terrestrial viscera. And one portion of those begetting, another of adolescents, the rest of those dying, sustain their vicissitudes; and the lot of the nascent sprouts in the place of the departed, and the number of the dying opens room for those being born.

XXIV. Restat, quod caput est sermonis huius, ut, super mundi rectore verba faciamus. Indigens quippe orationis huius videbatur ratio, nisi de mundo disputantes, etsi minus curiose, at quoquo modo possemus ... diceremus. De rectore quippe omnium non, ut ait ille, silere melius est, sed vel parum dicere.

24. It remains, which is the head (chief point) of this discourse, that we should speak concerning the Rector of the world. For the rationale of this oration seemed lacking, unless, while disputing about the world, even if less curiously, yet in whatever way we could ... we should say something. For concerning the Rector of all things it is not, as that one says, better to be silent, but rather to say even a little.

Vetus opinio est atque cogitationes omnium hominum penitus insedit, deum (esse) originis haberi auctorem deumque ipsum salutem esse et perseverantiam earum, quas effecerit, rerum. Neque ulla res est tam praestantibus viribus, quae eius viduata auxilio sui natura contenta sit. Hanc opinionem vates secuti profiteri ausi sunt, omnia Iove plena esse, cuius praesentiam non iam cogitatio sola, sed oculi et aures et sensibilis substantia conprehendit.

An old opinion it is, and the cogitation has deeply settled in all men, that God is held to be the author of origin, and that God himself is the salvation and the perseverance of the things which he has brought forth. Nor is there any thing of such preeminent powers that, bereft of his aid, it should be content with its own nature. Following this opinion the poets dared to profess that all things are full of Jove, whose presence not now thought alone, but eyes and ears and the sensible substance apprehend.

At haec conposita est potestati, non autem mai etati dei conveniens oratio. Sospitator quidem ille et genitor est omnium, qui ad conplendum mundum nati factique sunt; non tamen ut corporei laboris officio orbem istum manibus suis instruxerit, sed qui quadam infatigabili providentia et procul posita cuncta contingit, et maximis intervallis disiuncta conplectitur.

But this is a discourse fitted to power, yet not suitable to the majesty of God. He is indeed the Preserver and Begetter of all who have been born and made to fill up the world; not, however, as if by the office of bodily labor he fashioned this orb with his hands, but as one who, by a certain indefatigable Providence, touches all things set afar and embraces those disjoined by the greatest intervals.

XXV. Nec ambigitur eum praestantem ac sublimem sedem tenere et poetarum laudibus nomen eius consulum ac regum nuncupationibus praedicari et in arduis arcibus habere solium consecratum. Denique propiores quosque de potestate evis amplius trahere: corpora illa caelestia, quanto finitima sunt ei, tanto amplius de deo capere; multo minus, quae ab illis sunt secunda, et ad haec usque terrena pro intervallorum modo indulgentiarum dei ad nos usque beneficia pervenire. Sed cum credamus deum per omnia permeare et ad nos et (ad) ultra potestatem sui numinis tendere, quantum abest vel inminet, tantum existimandum est eum amplius minusuae rebus utilitatis dare.

25. Nor is it doubted that he holds a preeminent and sublime seat, and that his name is proclaimed in the praises of poets and by the appellations of consuls and kings, and that he has a consecrated throne on lofty citadels. Finally, that the nearer each thing is, the more it is drawn from his power: those heavenly bodies, the more they are contiguous to him, the more they take from God; much less do those that are second to them; and down even to these earthly things, according to the measure of the intervals, the benefits of God’s indulgences reach as far as to us. But since we believe that God permeates all things and that the power of his numen extends both to us and beyond us, in proportion as he is distant or imminent, so much must he be thought to grant to things more or less of usefulness.

Qua(m) re(m) rectius est atque honestius sic arbitrari: summam illam potestatem, sacratam caeli penetralibus, et illis qui longissime separentur, et proximis, una et eadem ratione et per se et per alios opem salutis adferre, nec penetrantem atque adeuntem specialiter singula nec indecore adtrectantem comminus cuncta. Talis quippe humilitas deiecti et minus sublimis officii, ne cum homine quidem convenit, qui sit vel paululum conscientiae celsioris. Militiae principes et curiae proceres et urbium ac domorum rectores dico numquam commissuros esse, ut id suis manibus factum velint, quod sit curae levioris fuscioris quodque possint nihilo sequius facere dominorum imperia ministeria servulorum.

For which reason it is more correct and more honorable to judge thus: that highest Power, hallowed in the inner sanctuaries of heaven, brings the aid of salvation both to those who are separated very far and to those who are near, by one and the same method, both by itself and through others, neither penetrating and approaching individual things in particular nor indecorously handling all things at close quarters. For such lowliness of an abased and less sublime office does not befit even a man who is even a little higher in conscience. I say that leaders of the soldiery, nobles of the curia, and rulers of cities and households would never be willing to allow that to be done by their own hands which belongs to a lighter, more sordid care, and which the ministries of servitors could carry out none the worse at the commands of their masters.

Exemplo quale sit istud intellege.

Understand by an example what that is like.

XXVI. Cambyses et Xerxes, et Darius potentissimis reges fuerunt; horum praepotentiam, quam ex opibus collegerant, lenocinium vitae effecerat celsiorem, cum eorum alter, apud Susam et Ecbatanas ut in fano quodam sacratus, nulli temere notitiam oris sui panderet, sed esset circumsaeptus admirabili regia, cuius tecta fulgerent eboris nive, argenti luce, flammis ex auro vel electri claritate. Limina vero alia prae aliis erant; interiores fores exteriores ianuae muniebant portaeque ferratae et muri adamantina firmitate. Ante fores viri fortes stipatoresque regalium laterum tutela pervigili custodiam per vices sortium sustinebant.Erant inter eos et divisa officia; in comitatu regio armigeri quidam, at extrinsecus singuli custodes locorum erant et ianitores et atrienses.

26. Cambyses and Xerxes, and Darius were most powerful kings; their prepotency, which they had collected from resources, the lure of life had made loftier, when one of them, at Susa and Ecbatana, as if consecrated in a certain shrine, would not rashly lay open to anyone the acquaintance of his face, but was surrounded by a wondrous palace, whose roofs flashed with the snow of ivory, the light of silver, flames from gold or the brilliance of electrum. The thresholds indeed were one before another; inner doors were fortified by outer entrances, and iron-gated portals and walls with adamantine firmness. Before the doors brave men and the bodyguards of the royal flanks, with wakeful tutelage, sustained the watch by turns assigned by lots.They also had among them divided duties; in the royal comitatus certain were armor-bearers, but on the outside there were individual guardians of the places, and doorkeepers and hall-attendants.

Sed inter eos aures regiae et imperatoris oculi quidam homines vocabantur. Per quae officiorum genera rex ille deus esse ab omnibus credebatur, cum omnia quae ubique gererentur (quae) ille otacustarum relatione discebat. Dispensatores pecuniae, quaestores vectigalium, tribunos aerarios habebat; alios et alios praefecerat ceteris muneribus: alii venatibus ugendis provinciam nacti, pars domibus et urbibus praefecti putabantur et ceteri, perpetuis magnisque curis, observationi singularum rerum adpositi erant.

But among them certain men were called the royal ears and the emperor’s eyes. Through these kinds of offices that king was believed by all to be a god, since he learned everything that was being done everywhere by the report of the otacusts (eavesdroppers). He had dispensers of money, quaestors of revenues, and aerarian tribunes; he had set various others over the remaining duties: some, having been assigned the province of driving the hunts, a portion were accounted prefects of households and cities, and the rest, with perpetual and great cares, were appointed to the observation of particular matters.

Sed omne Asiaticum regnum ab occidente Hellespontus terminabat, ab ortu gens inchoabat Indorum; duces ac satrapae ubique dispositi et permixta locis omnibus mancipia regalia. Ex eo numero erant excursores diurni atque nocturni, exploratores ac nuntii et specula[to]rum incensores adsidui; tum horum per vices incensae faces, ex omnibus regni sublimibus locis, in uno die imperatori significabant quod erat scitu opus.

But the whole Asiatic kingdom was bounded on the west by the Hellespont, and on the east the nation of the Indians began; commanders and satraps were posted everywhere, and royal bondservants were mingled through all places. From that number were couriers by day and by night, scouts and messengers, and constant kindlers of the lookouts’ beacons; then the torches kindled by these in turn, from all the lofty places of the kingdom, in a single day signaled to the emperor whatever it was needful to know.

XXVII. Igitur regnum illud ita conponi oportet cum mundi aula, ut inter se conparantur summus atque exsuperantissimus divum et homo ignavus et pessimus. Quod si cui viro vel cuilibet regi indecorum est per semetipsum procurare omnia quae perficere vult, multo magis de(e)o inconveniens erit. Quare sic putandum est eum maxime dignitatem maiestatemque retinere, si ipse in solio residat altissimo, eas autem potestates per omnes partes mundi orbisque dispendat, quae sint penes solem ac lunam cunctumque caelum; horum enim cura salutem terrenorum omnium gubernari.

27. Therefore that kingdom ought thus to be composed with the palace of the world, as the supreme and most supereminent of the gods and a slothful and worst man are compared with one another. And if it is unbecoming for any man or for any king to procure by himself all the things he wishes to accomplish, much more will it be inconvenient for a god. Wherefore thus must it be thought: that he most of all retains dignity and majesty, if he himself sits upon the highest throne, but dispenses those powers through all the parts of the world and of the orb, which are in the hands of the sun and the moon and the whole heaven; for by the care of these the safety of all earthly things is governed.

Nec multis opus est nec partitis hominum conservitiis, quibus propter ignaviam adpositum est pluribus indigere. An non eiusmodi conpendio machinatores fabricarum astutia unius conversionis multa et varia pariter administrant? En! etiam illi, qui in ligneolis hominum figuris gestus movent, quando filum membri, quod agitari volent, traxerint, torquebitur cervix, nutabit caput, oculi vibrabunt, manus ad[que] ministerium praesto erunt nec invenuste totus videbitur vivere.

There is need neither of many, nor of human services parceled out—services to which, on account of sloth, the necessity of more has been appended. Do not the machinators of works, by such an economy, with the astuteness of a single turning, at once administer many and various things? Lo! even those who move gestures in little wooden figures of men, when they have pulled the string of the limb which they wish to be set in motion, the neck will be twisted, the head will nod, the eyes will vibrate, the hands and the service will be at the ready, and not inelegantly the whole will seem to live.

Haud secus etiam caelestis potestas, cum initium sciente et salutifera opera moverit, ab imo ad secundum et deinceps ad proximum et usque ad supremum adtactu continuo vim suae maiestatis insinuat, aliud alio commovetur motusque unius alteri movendi se originem tradit. Mundo equidem consentiunt, non una, sed diversa via et plerumque contraria.

Not otherwise does the celestial power as well, when with knowledge and with salutary works it has set the beginning in motion, from the lowest to the second and thence to the next and even to the highest, by continuous contact insinuates the force of its majesty; one thing is stirred by another, and the motion of the one hands on to another the origin for moving itself. They indeed agree with the world, not by a single way, but by diverse and for the most part contrary ways.

XXVIII. Sed prima remissione ad motum data simplicique inchoato principio, inpulsibus mutuis, ut supra dictum est, moventur quidem omnia, sed ita ut, si quis sphaeram et quadratum et cylindrum et alias figuras per proclive simul iaciat, deferentur quidem omnia, sed non eodem genere movebuntur. Nec illud dissimile exemplum videri oportet, si quis pariter patefacto gremio animalis simul abire patiatur, volucrum, natatilium atque terrestrium; enimvero ad suum locum quaeque, duce natura, properabunt: pars aquam repetent, illa inter cicures atque agrestes legibus et institutis suis adgregabuntur, ibunt per aeris vias praepetes, quibus hoc natura largita est; atquin una ab humano sinu abeundi facultas concessa omnibus fuerat.

28. But once the first remission toward motion has been given and a simple beginning initiated, by mutual impulses, as said above, all things indeed are moved; yet in such a way that, if someone should at once cast down over a declivity a sphere and a square and a cylinder and other figures, all will indeed be carried downward, but they will not be moved in the same mode. Nor ought that to seem a dissimilar example, if someone, having his bosom opened at once, should allow animals to depart together—of birds, swimmers, and land-dwellers; for indeed each, with Nature as its guide, will hasten to its own place: some will seek the water again; others, whether tame or wild, will assemble according to their own laws and institutes; the swift-fliers, to whom Nature has bestowed this, will go along the ways of the air; and yet one and the same faculty of going forth from the human bosom had been granted to all.

XXIX. Sic natura mundi est constituta. Nam cum omne caelum ,simplici circumactu volvatur nocte diunque distinctum, diversis mensurarum aequalitatibus separatum, quamvis una omnia sphaera concluserit, incrementis tamen globi sui, decisione luminis menstrua tempora luna significat et caeli spatium sol annua reversione conlustrat eiusque comites amoenus Lucifer et com[mun]is Cyllenius. Stella etenim Pyrois, Mavortium sidus, circuli sui biennio conficit spatia; Iovis clarum fulgagensque sexies eadem multiplicat cursibus suis tempora, quae Saturnus sublimior XXX spatiis annorum circumerrat.

29. Thus the nature of the world is constituted. For since all heaven is rolled by a simple revolution, distinguished into night and day, separated by diverse equalities of measures, although one sphere has enclosed all things, yet by the increments of its globe and the cutting-off of light the moon signifies the monthly times, and the sun, by its annual return, illuminates the expanse of heaven, and its companions are the pleasant Lucifer and the com[mon] Cyllenius. For the star Pyrois, the Mavortian star, completes the spaces of its circle in a two-year period; Jove’s bright and glittering [star] by its courses multiplies those same times sixfold, which Saturn, more sublime, wanders through in 30 spans of years.

Verum inter haec una mundi conversio unusque reversionis est orbis et unus concentus atque unus stellarum chorus ex diversis occasibus ortibusque. Hoc ornamentum et velut monile kosmos rectissime Graeca lingua significat. At enim ut in choris, cum dux (carmini) hymno praecinit, concinentium vulgus virorum et feminarum, mixtis gravibus et acutis clamoribus, unam harmoniam resonant, sic divina mens mundanas varietates ad instar unius concentionis relevat.

But among these things there is one conversion of the world, and one orbit of returning, and one concert and one chorus of the stars out of diverse settings and risings. This ornament, and as it were necklace, the Greek tongue most rightly signifies by “kosmos.” And indeed, as in choruses, when the leader (for the song) leads off with a hymn, the crowd of men and women singing together, with low and high cries mingled, resound one harmony, so the divine mind raises the mundane varieties to the likeness of a single concert.

Nam cum caelum confixum vaporatis et radiantibus stellis inerranti cursu feratur et reciprocis itineribus astra consurgant, sol quidem omnituens ortu suo diem pandit, occasu noctem reducit conditusque vel relatus per plagas mundi IV temporum vices mutat. Hinc tempestivi imbres et spiritus haud infecundi, hinc alimenta roris et cetera[rum], quae accidere deus his mundi mediis partibus voluit. His adpositi sunt torrentium cursus et tumores undarum emicationesque silvarum, frugalis maturitas, fetus animalium, educationes etiam atque obitu singulorum.

For while the heaven, studded with vaporous and radiant stars, is borne along in an unerring course and the constellations rise with reciprocal journeys, the Sun indeed, all-beholding, by his rising spreads out the day, by his setting brings back the night, and, hidden or returned across the zones of the world, changes the alternations of the 4 seasons. Hence timely showers and breezes not unfruitful, hence the nourishments of dew and the rest, which God willed to befall in these middle parts of the world. To these are added the courses of torrents and the swells of the waves and the sproutings of forests, the fruitful ripeness, the offspring of animals, and even the rearings and the passing of individuals.

XXX. Cum igitur rex omnium et pater, quem tantummodo animae oculis nostrae cogitationes vident, machinam omnem iugiter per circuitum suis legibus terminatam, claram et sideribus relucentem speciesque innumeras modo propalam, saepe conectas, ab uno, ut supra dixi, principio agitari iubet, simile istuc esse bellicis rebus hinc liceat arbitrari. Nam cum tuba bellicum cecinit, milites clangore incensi alius accingitur gladio, alius clipeum capit, ille lorica se induit, hic galea caput vel crura ocreis involvit et equum temperat frenis et iugales ad concordiam copulat; et protinus unusquisque conpetens capessit officium: velites excursionem adornant, ordinibus principes curant, equites cor[di]nibus praesunt, ceteri negotia quae nacti sunt agitant cum interea unius ducis imperio tantus exercitus paret, quem praefecerit, penes quem est summa rerum. Non aliter divinarum et humanarum rerum status regitur, quando uno moderamine contenta omnia pensum sui operis agnoscunt curatque omnibus occulta vis, nullis oculis obvia, nisi quibus mens aciem suae lucis intendit.

30. Since therefore the king and father of all, whom only with the eyes of the soul our thoughts behold, bids the whole machine—unceasingly in its circuit, bounded by its own laws, bright and re-lucent with the stars, and the innumerable forms now displayed openly, often conjoined—to be driven by one principle, as I said above, let it be permitted from this to consider it similar to warlike affairs. For when the trumpet has sounded the battle-call, the soldiers, enflamed by the clangor, one girds himself with a sword, another takes up a shield, this one puts on a cuirass, that one wraps his head with a helmet or his legs with greaves, and he controls his horse with the reins and couples the yoke-mates into concord; and straightway each man competent seizes his office: the skirmishers prepare a foray, the leaders care for the ranks, the cavalry are set over the squadrons, the rest prosecute the tasks they have gotten—while meanwhile so great an army obeys the command of one general, whom he has set over them, in whose hands is the sum of affairs. Not otherwise is the state of divine and human things governed, when, content under a single governance, all acknowledge the assignment of their own work; and a hidden power cares for all, apparent to no eyes except to those upon which the mind directs the edge of its own light.

XXXI. Nec tamen hoc vel illi ad moliendum vel nobis ad intelligendum obest. De inferiore licet imagine capiamus exempla. Anima in homine non videtur et tamen fateantur omnes necesse est huius opera omnia quae per hominem praeclara fiunt provenire nec ipsius animae qualitatem ac figuram oculis occurrere, sed momentis ab ea gestarum rerum intellegi, qualis et quanta sit.

31. Nor yet does this hinder either Him in effecting or us in understanding. From a lower image let us take examples. The soul in man is not seen, and yet all must needs admit that by its operation all the illustrious things that are accomplished through man proceed; nor do the quality and the figure of the soul itself meet the eyes, but from the evidences of deeds done by it one understands of what sort and how great it is.

Omne quippe humanae vitae praesidium ingenio eius est paratum: cultus agrorum ususque frugum, artificum sollertia, proventus artium, commoditates vitae humanae. Quid de legibus dicam, quae ad mansuefaciendos homines inventae sunt? quid de civilibus institutis ac moribus, qui nunc populorum otiosis conventibus frequentantur, et asperitate bellorum pacata, mitigantur quiete?

For indeed every safeguard of human life has been prepared by its ingenuity: the cultivation of fields and the use of crops, the skill of craftsmen, the yield of the arts, the commodities of human life. What shall I say of the laws, which were invented for the taming of men? what of civil institutions and morals, which are now frequented in the leisured assemblies of peoples, and, the harshness of wars pacified, are mitigated by quiet?

Nisi forte tam iniustus rerum aestimator potest esse, qui haec eadem de deo neget, quem videat esse viribus exsuperantissimis, augustissima specie, inmortalis aevi, genitorem virtutum ipsamque virtutem. Vnde nihil mirum est, si mortales oculi non capiunt eius adspectum, quando divinorum operum vestigiis sit perspicuus atque manifestus.

Unless perhaps someone can be so unjust an estimator of things as to deny these same points about God, whom he sees to be of most surpassing powers, of most august aspect, of immortal age, the begetter of virtues and virtue itself. Whence it is nothing wondrous if mortal eyes do not take in his sight, since by the footprints of divine works he is perspicuous and manifest.

XXXII. Ceterum ea, quae vel caelo accidere oculis advertimus et terra et aqua fieri, dei etiam illa credenda sunt. Quidni? (de) verum eius cui tutela mundi huius et cura est, de quo Empedocles prudenter his verbis sensit: Panth'osa t'en, hosa t'esth', hosa t'estai opisso Dendrea t'ethlastese kai aneres ede gynaikes, Theres t'oionoi te, kai hydatothremmenos ichthys.

32. Moreover, those things which we observe with our eyes to happen in the sky and to be wrought on earth and in water are to be credited to God as well. Why not? indeed, to him whose guardianship and care of this world it is—about whom Empedocles wisely conceived in these words: All things that are, that have been, and that will be hereafter—trees that have sprung up, and men and women, beasts and birds, and the fish nourished by water.

Phidian illum, quem fictorem probum fuisse tradit memoria, vidi ipse in clipeo Minervae, quae arcibus Atheniensibus praesidet, oris sui similitudinem conligasse, ita ut, si quis olim artificis voluisset exinde imaginem separare, soluta conpage simulacri totius incolumitas interiret. Ad hoc instar mundi salutem, tuetur deus, aptam et revinctam sui numinis potestate.

That Phidias, whom tradition records to have been an excellent sculptor, I myself saw to have incorporated in the shield of Minerva—who presides over the Athenian citadels—the likeness of his own face, such that, if anyone at some time had wished to separate from it the image of the artist, with the framework loosened the integrity of the whole statue would perish. After this pattern God protects the safety of the world, fitted and bound fast by the power of his numen.

XXXIII. Huius locum si quaerimus, neque finitimus est terrae contagionibus nec tamen medius in aere turbido, verum in mundano fastigio, quem Graeci ouranon recte vocant, ut qui sit altitudinis finis. Olympon etiam idem illa ratione eum nominant, quem ab omni fuscitate ac perturbatione vident liberum. Neque enim caliginem nubium recipit vel pruinas et nives sustinet nec pulsatur ventis nec imbribus caeditur.

33. If we ask the place of this, it is neither adjacent to the pollutions of the earth nor yet midway in the turbid air, but on the cosmic summit, which the Greeks rightly call ouranon, as being the limit of height. Olympus also they name it for that reason, which they see to be free from all duskiness and perturbation. For it neither admits the gloom of clouds nor endures hoarfrosts and snows, nor is it buffeted by winds nor beaten by rains.

Haec enim nec Olympo, qui est celsitudinis summae, contingere poeta his verbis cecinit: Oulympond'hoti phasi theon hedos asphales aiei Emmenai; out'anemoisi tinassetai oute pot'ombroi Devetai oute chion epipilnatai, alla mal'aithre Peptatai annephelos, leuke d'epidedromen aigle. Hanc opinionem communis mos et hominum observationes secutae adfirmant superiora esse deo tradita. Namque habitus orantium sic est ut manibus extensis ad caelum precemur.

For the poet sang in these words that these things do not touch even Olympus, which is of the highest loftiness: “They say that Olympus is the secure seat of the gods forever; neither do winds shake it, nor ever do rains wet it, nor does snow come upon it; but rather it is spread with very clear aether, cloudless, and a white radiance runs over it.” This opinion, followed by common custom and the observations of men, affirms that the higher things have been entrusted to God. For the posture of those praying is such that with hands outstretched to heaven we pray.

Romanus etiam poeta sic sensit: Aspice hoc sublime candens, quem invocant omnes Iovem. Vnde illa, quae videntur suntque omnibus praestantiora, easdem sublimitates regionum tenent, astra caelestia et mundi lumina; ac merito illis ordine licet perpetuo frui nec diversis spatiis et temporibus observantissimam legem suorum aliquando itinerum mentiuntur.

Also the Roman poet felt thus: “Look upon this sublime, shining height, whom all invoke as Jove.” Whence those things which are seen and are most preeminent above all hold those same sublimities of the regions—the celestial stars and the lights of the world; and deservedly it is permitted to them to enjoy a perpetual order, nor in diverse spaces and times do they ever belie the most observant law of their itineraries.

XXXIV. Terrena omnia mutationes et conversiones, postremo interitus habent. Namque inmodicis tremoribus terrarum dissiluisse humum et interceptas urbes cum populis saepe cognovimus. Audimus etiam abruptis imbribus prolutas esse totas regiones; illas etiam, quae prius fuerint continentes, hospitibus atque advenis fluctibus insulatas, alias, desidia maris, pedestri accessu pervias factas.

34. All earthly things have changes and conversions, and at last destruction. For we have often known the ground to have burst asunder by excessive earthquakes, and cities together with their peoples to have been seized away. We also hear that, by sudden downpours, whole regions have been washed away; and that those which previously had been mainland have been made into islands by strange and adventitious waves, while others, through the sea’s idleness, have been made passable on foot.

Quid? qui ventis et procellis civitates eversas esse meminerunt? Quid?

What of those who remember cities overthrown by winds and tempests? What?

cum incendia de nubibus emicarunt? cum orientis regiones Phaethontis ruina, ut quidam putant, conflagratae perierunt? in occidentis plagis scaturrigines quaedam ac proluviones easdem strages dederunt?

What of when fires flashed out from the clouds? when the regions of the East, by the ruin of Phaethon, as some think, were conflagrated and perished? in the tracts of the West certain spouts and deluges wrought the same destructions?

Sic ex Aetnae verticibus quondam effusis crateribus divino incendio per declivia, torrentis vice, flammarum flumina cucurrerunt. In quo periculi vertice egregium pietatis meritum fuisse cognovimus.Namque eos qui, principio fragoris territi, sensum tamen clementiae misericordiaeque retinebant et grandaevos parentes ereptos volucri clade suis cervicibus sustinebant, illa flammarum fluenta, divino separata discidio, quasi duo flumina ex uno fonte manantia, locum illum ambire maluerunt obsidione innocenti, ubi erant boni baiuli religiosis sarcinis occupati.

Thus from Aetna’s summits, when the craters once were poured out, by a divine conflagration down the slopes, in the stead of a torrent, rivers of flames ran. At the very summit of that peril we have recognized an outstanding merit of piety.For those who, frightened at the first crash, yet retained a sense of clemency and mercy, and bore upon their own necks their aged parents, snatched from the winged disaster, those streams of flames, separated by a divine sundering, as though two rivers flowing from one source, preferred to encircle that place with an innocent siege, where the good bearers were occupied with their religious burdens.

XXXV. Postremo, quod est in triremi gubernator, in curru rector, praecentor in choris, lex in urbe, dux in exercitu, hoc est in mundo deus, nisi quod ceteris aerumnosum et multiplex et curarum innumerabilium videtur esse hoc ipsum, alicuius officii principem fieri, deo vero nec tristis nec onerosa est imperii sui cura. Namque inmobilis circumfert et regit cuncta(s), naturas formasque diversis regionibus commovens, ut est lex civitatis semel promulgata, perpetuis observationum rationibus fixa, ipsa quidem inmutabilis, at eius arbitrio parentium mentes agitantur nutuque eius et dominatione flectuntur: ex scitis eius magistratus tribunalia, principia milites frequentabunt, recuperatores iudiciis praesidebunt, decuriones et quibus ius est dicendae sententiae ad consessum publicum commeabunt; et alius ad Minuciam frumentatum venit et aliis in iudiciis dies dicitur;reus purgandi se necessitate, insectandi studio accusator venit; ille moriturus ad supplicii locum dicitur, hic ad convivii repotia (et) vespertinus comisator adventat. Sunt et publicarum epularum apparatus et lectisternia deorum et dies festi, ludi scaenici ludique circenses; diis sacrificatur, Geniis ministratur, obitis libatione profunditur aliusque alio fungitur munere parentque omnes iussis legum et communis imperii.

35. Finally, what the helmsman is in a trireme, the driver in a chariot, the precentor in choirs, the law in a city, the leader in an army, this is God in the world—save that, whereas to others this very thing seems to be toilsome and manifold and of innumerable cares, namely to become the chief of some office, to God the care of his rule is neither sad nor burdensome. For, immobile, he bears about and governs all things, moving natures and forms in diverse regions, as the law of a commonwealth once promulgated, fixed by perpetual rules of observances, itself indeed unchangeable, while the minds of those obeying are stirred at its discretion and are bent by its nod and dominion: from his decrees the magistrates will attend the tribunals, the soldiers the headquarters, the recuperatores will preside over trials, the decurions and those who have the right of pronouncing an opinion will go to the public session; and one comes to the Minucia for grain, and for others a day is appointed in the courts; the defendant comes by the necessity of purging himself, the accuser by zeal for prosecuting; that man, about to die, is summoned to the place of punishment, this one arrives for the banquet’s after-drinking (and) as an evening carouser. There are also the preparations of public banquets and lectisternia of the gods and feast days, scenic games and circus games; sacrifice is offered to the gods, service is rendered to the Genii, for the dead a libation is poured forth, and one man performs one office, another another, and all obey the commands of the laws and of the common dominion.

Videasque illam civitatem pariter spirantem Panchaeis odoribus et graveolentibus caenis, resonantem hymnis et carminibus et canticis, eandem etiam lamentis et ploratibus heiulantem.

And you would see that city alike breathing Panchaean odors and rank‑smelling banquets, resounding with hymns and songs and canticles, the same also ululating with laments and weepings.

XXXVI. Ad hunc modum res agi et in mundo aestimemus; lex illa vergens ad aequitatis tenorem sit deus, nulla indigens correctione mutabili. Quippe sic et mundi universitas regitur, dum speculatur ad omnia rector eius atque inmutabiliter incumbit spargiturque vis illa seminibus inclusa per naturas omnium speciesque et genera digesta. Sic faciles vitium lapsus et palmarum ardua, persicorum rubor, laevitas mali gignitur, dulcitas fici; et quae infelicia propter infecunditatem vocamus, tamen utilia sunt alio pacto: platani, ut ait poeta, umbras potantibus ministrantes et acuta pinus et rasiles buxi, odora laurus, cupressorum odoratius lignum; tandem omnium animalius agrestium et cicurum, pinnatarum et pedestrium et aquatilium natura gignitur, nutritur, absumitur, parens caelestibus institutis: pan gar hempeton plegei nemetai, ut Heraclitus ait.

XXXVI. Let us estimate that things are transacted in the world after this fashion; let that law inclining to the tenor of equity be God, needing no correction by change. For thus too the universality of the world is ruled, while its governor watches over all things and unchangeably bears upon them, and that force, shut up within seeds, is scattered through the natures of all things and is distributed into species and genera. Thus are generated the easy droopings of the vines and the heights of the palms, the blush of peaches, the smoothness of the apple, the sweetness of the fig; and those which we call unfortunate by reason of infertility are nevertheless useful in another way: the plane-trees, as the poet says, supplying shade to drinkers, and the sharp-pointed pine, and the boxwoods fit for turning, the odorous laurel, the more fragrant wood of cypresses; finally, the nature of all animals, wild and tame, winged and walking and aquatic, is begotten, is nourished, is consumed, obeying celestial ordinances: “for every creeping thing is pastured by blows,” as Heraclitus says.

XXXVII. Et cum sit unus, pluribus nominibus cietur, specierum multitudine, quarum diversitate fit multiformis vis. Idem ab iuvando Iuppiter dictus, quem Zena Graeci, quod vitae nostrae auctor sit, rectissime appellant. Saturnum etiam illi Kronon, quasi chronon quendam, incoeptum ab origine, interminum ad finem tempus appellant.

37. And although he is one, he is summoned by many names, by the multitude of species, by whose diversity the force becomes multiform. The same is called Jupiter from helping (ab iuvando), whom the Greeks most correctly call Zena, because he is the author of our life. They also call Saturn Kronon, as though some chronon, time begun from the origin, without boundary unto the end.

Fulgurator et tonitrualis et fulminator, etiam imbricitor, et item dicitur serenator; et plures eum frugiferum vocant, multi urbis custodem, alii, hospitalem, amicalem et omnium officiorum nominibus appellant. Est militaris, est triumphator et propagator, tropaeophorus; et multo plura eiusmodi apud haruspices et Romanos veteres inveneris. Orpheus vero hanc effari potestatem volens, his de eo verbis canit:

Fulgurator and Tonitrual and Fulminator, even Imbricitor, and likewise he is called Serenator; and many call him frugiferous, many the guardian of the city, others, hospitable, friendly, and they address him by the names of all offices. He is military, he is a triumphator and propagator, a tropaeophorus; and you will find many more of this sort among the haruspices and the old Romans. But Orpheus, wishing to utter this power, sings of him with these words:

Zeus protos geneto, Zeus hysteros, archikeraukos;
Zeus kephale, Zeus messa; Dios d'ek panta tetyktai.
Zeus pythmen gaies te kai ouranou asteroentos.
Zeus arsen trepheto, Zeus amthropos epleto nymphe.

Zeus first came to be, Zeus last, chief thunderbolt-wielder;
Zeus the head, Zeus the middle; and from Zeus all things have been fashioned.
Zeus the foundation of the earth and of starry heaven.
Zeus was nurtured as male; Zeus became woman, a maiden.

Zeus pnoie panton, Zeus akamatou pyros horme.
Zeus pontou rhiza, Zeus helios ede selene.
Zeus basileus, Zeus archos hapanton, archikeraunos;
Pantas gar krypsas authis phaos es polygethes
Ek katharas kradies anenenkato mermera rhethon.

Zeus the breath of all, Zeus the impulse of unwearied fire.
Zeus the root of the sea, Zeus the sun and also the moon.
Zeus the king, Zeus the archon of all, the chief-thunderer;
for, having hidden all things, again into much-rejoicing light
from a pure heart he brought up the dire utterance.

XXXVIII. Fatum autem Graeci heimarmenen a tractu quodam invicem causarum se continentium volunt dici, decretum idem pepromenen dicunt, quod omnia in hoc statu rerum definita sint nec sit in hoc mundo aliquid interminatum; idem fatum moiran vocant, quod ex partibus constet; hinc ennomon, quod unicuique adtributio sua sit adscripta . Adrasteia denique est ineffugibilis necessitas ultionis. Sed tria Fata sunt, numerus cum ratione temporis faciens, si potestatem earum ad eiusdem similitudinem temporis referas. Nam quod in fuso perfectum est praeteriti temporis habet speciem, et quod torquetur in digitis momenti praesentis indicat spatia, et quod nondum ex colo tractum est subactumque cura digitorum, id futuri et consequentis saeculi posteriora videtur ostendere.

38. Fate, moreover, the Greeks wish to call heimarmene from a certain traction of causes mutually containing one another; the decree they call the same pepromene, because all things in this state of affairs are defined and there is nothing unbounded in this world; the same fate they call moira, because it consists of parts; hence ennomon, because to each one its own attribution has been assigned. Adrasteia, finally, is the inescapable necessity of retribution. But there are three Fates, making a number in accord with the rationale of time, if you refer their power to the likeness of that same time. For what has been perfected on the spindle has the aspect of past time, and what is being twisted in the fingers indicates the spans of the present moment, and what has not yet been drawn from the distaff and worked by the care of the fingers, that seems to display the things later of the future and subsequent age.

Haec illis condicio; et nominum eiusdem proprietate contingit, ut sit Atropos praeteriti temporis fatum, quod ne deus quidem faciet infectum; futuri temporis Lachesis a fine cognominata, quod etiam illis quae futura sunt finem suum deus dederit. Clotho praesentis temporis habet curam, ut ipsis actionibus suadeat, ne cura sollers rebus omnibus desit. Deum vero ire per omnes Terrasque tractusque maria caelumque profundum non frustra arbitrabitur, qui audiet Platonis haec verba: "deus namque, sicut vetus", inquit, "continet ratio, principia et fines et media rerum omnium penetrat atque inlustrat ac curru volucri superfertur; eundem deum ultrix Necessitas semper et ubique comitatur, eorum qui a sacra lege discesserint vindex futura; quam faciet ille mitificam, qui statim a tenero et ipsis incunabulis intellexit, extimuit eique se totum dedit atque permisit".

This is their condition; and by the very property of their names it comes about that Atropos is the fate of past time, which not even god will make un-done; Lachesis is of future time, surnamed from the limit, because even to those things which are going to be god will have given their limit. Clotho has the care of present time, so that by the actions themselves she may urge that skillful care be not lacking to all things. Nor will he think it in vain that god goes through all lands and tracts and seas and the deep heaven, who will hear these words of Plato: "for god, as the old doctrine maintains," he says, "encompasses, and the beginnings and ends and middles of all things he penetrates and illuminates, and he is borne above in a winged chariot; the same god avenging Necessity always and everywhere accompanies, destined to be the vindicator of those who shall have departed from the sacred law; her he will make gentle, who straightway from tender age and from the very swaddling-clothes understood, stood in awe of her, and gave and surrendered himself wholly to her."