Seneca: QUAESTIONES NATURALES

[1] Non praeterit me, Lucili uirorum optime, quam magnarum rerum fundamenta ponam senex, qui mundum circuire constitui et causas secretaque eius eruere atque aliis noscenda producere: quando tam multa consequar, tam sparsa colligam, tam occulta perspiciam?

[1] It does not escape me, Lucilius, best of men, what great matters’ foundations I, an old man, am laying, who have determined to go around the world and to excavate its causes and secrets and to produce them to be known by others: when shall I accomplish so many things, collect things so scattered, perceive things so hidden?

[2] Premit a tergo senectus et obicit annos inter uana studia consumptos. Tanto magis urgeamus et damna aetatis male exemptae labor sarciat; nox ad diem accedat, occupationes recidantur, patrimonii longe a domino iacentis cura soluatur, sibi totus animus uacet et ad contemplationem sui saltem in ipso fine respiciat.

[2] Old age presses from behind and casts up the years consumed among vain studies. All the more let us urge on, and let labor patch the damages of a lifetime ill expended; let night accede to day, let occupations be cut back, let the care of a patrimony lying far from its master be dissolved, let the mind be wholly free for itself and, for the contemplation of itself, at least at the very end, let it look back.

[3] Faciet ac sibi instabit et cotidie breuitatem temporis metietur; quicquid amissum est, id diligenti usu praesentis uitae recolliget: fidelissimus est ad honesta ex paenitentia transitus. Libet igitur mihi exclamare illum poetae incliti uersum : "tollimus ingentes animos et maxima paruo tempore molimur." Hoc dicerem, si puer iuuenisque molirer (nullum enim non tam magnis rebus tempus angustum est): nunc uero ad rem seriam, grauem, immensam post meridianas horas accessimus.

[3] He will do it and press himself on and every day will measure the brevity of time; whatever has been lost, he will recollect by a diligent use of present life: the most faithful transition to honorable things is from penitence. It pleases me therefore to exclaim that verse of the renowned poet : "we raise vast spirits and the greatest things in a small time we undertake." This I would say, if as a boy and a young man I were endeavoring (for no time is not narrow for matters so great): now indeed to a serious, grave, immense business we have come after the afternoon hours.

[4] Faciamus quod in itinere fieri solet: qui tardius exierunt, uelocitate pensant moram. Festinemus et opus nescio an superabile, magnum certe, sine aetatis excusatione tractemus. Crescit animus, quotiens coepti magnitudinem attendit, et cogitat quantum proposito, non quantum sibi supersit.

[4] Let us do what is wont to be done on a journey: those who have set out more slowly compensate the delay by velocity. Let us hasten, and let us handle the work—I know not whether superable, certainly great—without the excuse of age. The spirit grows, as often as it attends to the magnitude of the begun enterprise, and thinks how much for the purpose, not how much may remain for himself.

[5] Consumpsere se quidam, dum acta regum externorum componunt quaeque passi inuicem ausique sunt populi. Quanto satius est sua mala extinguere quam aliena posteris tradere! Quanto potius deorum opera celebrare quam Philippi aut Alexandri latrocinia ceterorumque, qui exitio gentium clari non minores fuere pestes mortalium quam inundatio, qua planum omne perfusum est, quam conflagratio, qua magna pars animantium exarsit!

[5] Certain men have consumed themselves, while they compose the acts of foreign kings
and what the peoples in turn have suffered and dared. How much
more preferable it is to extinguish one’s own ills than to hand down others’ to posterity!
How much rather to celebrate the works of the gods than the latrociny of Philip or Alexander
and of the rest, who, famous for the destruction of nations, were no
lesser plagues of mortals than the inundation, by which every plain
was drenched, than the conflagration, by which a great part of living creatures blazed!

[6] Quemadmodum Hannibal Alpes superiecerit scribunt, quemadmodum confirmatum Hispaniae cladibus bellum Italiae inopinatus intulerit fractisque rebus, etiam post Carthaginem pertinax, reges pererrauerit contra Romanos ducem promittens, exercitum petens; quemadmodum non desierit omnibus angulis bellum senex quaerere: adeo sine patria pati poterat, sine hoste non poterat!

[6] They write how Hannibal hurled himself over the Alps; how, the war confirmed by Spain’s calamities, he unexpectedly brought it upon Italy; and how, with his affairs broken, even after Carthage, pertinacious, he wandered among kings, promising a leader against the Romans, seeking an army; how he did not cease, as an old man, to seek war in every corner: to such a degree he could suffer without a fatherland, he could not without an enemy!

[7] Quanto satius est quid faciendum sit quam quid factum quaerere, ac docere eos, qui sua permisere fortunae, nihil stabile ab illa datum esse, munus eius omne aura fluere mobilius! Nescit enim quiescere, gaudet laetis tristia substituere, utique miscere; itaque secundis nemo confidat, aduersis nemo deficiat: alternae sunt uices rerum.

[7] How much more preferable it is to ask what ought to be done rather than what has been done, and to teach those who have surrendered their own affairs to Fortune that nothing stable is given by her, that her every gift flows more mobile than a breeze! For she does not know how to rest; she delights to substitute sad things for glad things, and in any case to commingle them; therefore let no one trust in prosperous things, let no one lose heart in adverse ones: the vicissitudes of affairs are alternate.

[8] Quid exultas? Ista, quibus eueheris in summum, nescis ubi te relictura sint: habebunt suum, non tuum finem. Quid iaces?

[8] Why do you exult? Those things, by which you are borne up to the summit, you do not know where they are going to leave you: they will have their own, not your, end. Why do you lie prostrate?

Ad imum delatus es: nunc locus est resurgendi; in melius aduersa, in deterius optata flectuntur.

To the bottom you have been borne down: now is the time for rising again; to the better the adverse, to the worse the desired are bent.

[9] Ita concipienda est animo uarietas non priuatarum tantum domuum, quas leuis casus impellit, sed publicarum. Regna ex infimo coorta supra imperantes constiterunt, uetera imperia in ipso flore ceciderunt; iniri non potest numerus, quam multa ab aliis fracta sint: nunc cum maxime deus extruit alia, alia summittit, nec molliter ponit sed ex fastigio suo nullas habitura reliquias iactat.

[9] Thus must the variety be conceived in the mind
not only of private households, which a slight chance impels,
but of public ones. Kingdoms arisen from the lowest have stood above those who command,
ancient empires have fallen in their very bloom; the number cannot be computed,
how many things have been shattered by others: now especially
god builds up some, lowers others, nor does he set them down softly but
from their own pinnacle he flings them, leaving no remains.

[10] Magna ista, quia parui sumus, credimus: multis rebus non ex natura sua sed ex humilitate nostra magnitudo est. Quid praecipuum in rebus humanis est? Non classibus maria complesse nec in Rubri maris litore signa fixisse nec, deficiente ad iniurias terra, errasse in oceano ignota quaerentem, sed animo omne uidisse et, qua maior nulla uictoria est, uitia domuisse: innumerabiles sunt qui populos, qui urbes habuerunt in potestate, paucissimi qui se.

[10] We believe those things to be great, because we are small: for many things their magnitude is not from their own nature but from our lowliness. What is principal in human affairs? Not to have filled the seas with fleets, nor to have fixed the standards on the shore of the Red Sea, nor, the land failing for the infliction of injuries, to have wandered on the ocean seeking the unknown, but to have seen everything with the mind and, than which no victory is greater, to have tamed vices: innumerable are they who have had peoples, who have had cities, in their power; very few who have had themselves.

[11] Quid est praecipuum? Erigere animum supra minas et promissa fortunae; nihil dignum putare, quod speres. Quid enim habet, quod concupiscas?

[11] What is principal? To raise the mind above the threats and the promises of fortune; to deem nothing worthy that you should hope for. What indeed does it have that you should covet?

qui a diuinorum conuersatione quotiens ad humana recideris, non aliter caligabis quam quorum oculi in densam umbram ex claro sole redierunt.

you who, from conversation with things divine,
whenever you fall back to human things, will grow dim no otherwise than
those whose eyes have returned into dense shadow from bright sun.

[12] Quid est praecipuum? Posse laeto animo aduersa tolerare; quicquid acciderit, sic ferre, quasi tibi uolueris accidere (debuisses enim uelle, si scisses omnia ex decreto dei fieri: flere, queri et gemere desciscere est).

[12] What is the principal thing? To be able to tolerate adverse things with a cheerful spirit; whatever shall have happened, to bear it thus, as if you had wished it to happen to you (for you ought to have wished it, if you had known that all things come to pass by the decree of God: to weep, to complain, and to groan is to defect).

[13] Quid est praecipuum? Animus contra calamitates fortis et contumax, luxuriae non auersus tantum sed infestus, nec auidus periculi nec fugax, qui sciat fortunam non expectare sed facere et aduersus utramque intrepidus inconfususque prodire, nec illius tumultu nec huius fulgore percussus.

[13] What is the chief thing? A mind
strong and contumacious against calamities, not only averse
to luxury but hostile, neither avid of danger nor prone to flight, one who knows
not to await fortune but to make it, and to go forth intrepid
and unconfounded against both, struck neither by the tumult of that one nor by the splendor
of this one.

[14] Quid est praecipuum? Non admittere in animo mala consilia, puras ad caelum manus tollere, nullum bonum petere quod, ut ad te transeat, aliquis dare debet aliquis amittere, optare quod sine aduersario optatur: bonam mentem; cetera magno aestimata mortalibus, etiamsi quis domum casus adtulerit, sic intueri quasi exitura qua uenerint.

[14] What is the principal thing? Not to admit in the mind
evil counsels, to raise pure hands to heaven, to seek no good
which, so that it may pass to you, someone must give and someone must lose,
to desire that which is desired without an adversary: a good mind; the rest,
greatly esteemed by mortals, even if chance has brought them home to someone,
to regard thus as about to exit by the way they have come.

[15] Quid est praecipuum? Altos supra fortuita spiritus tollere, hominis meminisse, ut, siue felix eris, scias hoc non futurum diu, siue infelix, scias hoc te non esse, si non putes.

[15] What is the principal thing? To lift the spirit high above fortuitous things, to remember that you are human, so that, whether you will be fortunate, you may know this will not be for long, or whether unfortunate, you may know that you are not this, if you do not think so.

[16] Quid est praecipuum? In primis labris animam habere: haec res efficit non e iure Quiritium liberum sed e iure naturae. Liber est autem, qui seruitutem suam effugit: haec est assidua et ineluctabilis et per diem ac noctem aequaliter premens, sine interuallo, sine commeatu.

[16] What is the principal thing? To have one’s soul on the very lips: this makes a man free not by the law of the Quirites but by the law of nature. Free, moreover, is he who escapes his servitude: this is continual and ineluctable and, by day and by night, presses equally, without interval, without furlough.

[17] Sibi seruire grauissima est seruitus: quam discutere facile est, si desieris multa te poscere, si desieris tibi referre mercedem, si ante oculos et naturam tuam posueris et aetatem, licet prima sit, ac tibi ipse dixeris: "Quid insanio? quid anhelo? quid sudo?

[17] To be a slave to oneself is the most grievous servitude: to shake it off is easy, if you cease to demand many things for yourself, if you cease to reckon recompense to yourself, if you set before your eyes both your nature and your age, though it be first, and say to yourself: "Why do I rave? why do I pant? why do I sweat?

quid terram, quid forum uerso? Nec multo opus est nec diu."

why do I turn the earth, why the forum? There is need of neither much nor for long."

[18] Ad hoc proderit nobis inspicere rerum naturam: primo discedemus a sordidis; deinde animam ipsum, quo sano magnoque opus est, seducemus a corpore; deinde in occultis exercitata subtilitas non erit in aperta deterior. Nihil est autem apertius his salutaribus, quae contra nequitiam nostram furoremque discuntur, quae damnamus nec ponimus.

[18] To this it will profit us to inspect the nature of things: primo
we shall depart from the sordid; deinde we shall draw off the soul itself from the body—a task that requires a sound and great spirit; deinde in occultis
subtlety exercised will not be worse in the open. Nothing, moreover, is more open than these salutary things, which are learned against our iniquity and fury,
which we condemn and do not put into practice.

[1,1] Quaeramus ergo de terrestribus aquis et inuestigemus qua ratione fiant (siue, ut ait Ouidius, "fons erat illimis nitidis argenteus undis", siue, ut ait Uergilius, "unde per ora nouem uasto cum murmure montis it mare praeruptum et pelago premit arua sonanti; siue, ut apud te, lunior carissime, inuenio, "Elius Siculis de fontibus exilit amnis"; si qua ratio aquas subministrat; quomodo tot flumina ingentia per diem noctemque decurrant; quare alia hibernis aquis intumescant, alia in defectu ceterorum amnium crescant.

[1,1] Let us therefore inquire about terrestrial waters and investigate by what rationale they come to be (whether, as Ovid says, "the spring was unsilted, with gleaming, argent waters", or, as Vergil says, "from where, through nine mouths, with the vast murmur of the mountain
the sea goes precipitous and with the resounding deep presses the fields; or, as I find in your pages, dearest Junior, "the river Elius leaps forth from Sicilian springs"; whether any principle supplies the waters; how so many vast rivers run down by day and night; why some swell with winter waters, others grow when the rest of the rivers are at low water.

[1,2] Nilum interim seponemus a turba, propriae naturae ac singularis, et illi suum diem dabimus. Nunc uulgares aquas persequamur, tam frigidas quam calentes: in quibus [calentibus] quaerendum erit, utrum calidae nascantur an fiant. De ceteris quoque disseremus, quas insignes aut sapor aut aliqua reddit utilitas: quaedam enim oculos, quaedam neruos iuuant; quaedam inueterata et desperata a medicis uitia percurant; quaedam medentur ulceribus; quaedam interiora potu fouent et pulmonis ac uiscerum querelas leuant; quaedam supprimunt sanguinem: tam uarius singulis usus quam gustus est.

[1,2] The Nile
we will meanwhile set apart from the crowd, of a proper nature and singular, and to it
we will give its own day. Now let us pursue the common waters, as
cold as well as hot: in which [hot ones] it will have to be inquired
whether they are born hot or are made so. Of the others too we shall discourse,
which either flavor or some utility renders notable: for certain
help the eyes, certain the nerves; certain cure inveterate maladies and those despaired of
by physicians; certain heal ulcers;
certain by drink foment the inner parts and lighten the complaints of the lung and the viscera;
certain suppress blood: so various is the use for each as is the taste.

[2,1] Aut stant omnes aquae aut eunt aut colliguntur aut uarias habent uenas. Aliae dulces sunt, aliae uarie asperae; quippe interueniunt salsae amaraeque aut medicatae, ex quibus sulphuratas dicimus, ferratas, aluminosas: indicat uim sapor.

[2,1] Either all waters stand still or go or are gathered or have various veins. Others are sweet, others variously harsh; indeed salty and bitter, or medicated, occur among them, of which we say there are sulphurated, ferriferous, aluminous: taste indicates the power.

[2,2] Habent praeterea multa discrimina, primum tactus: frigidae calidaeque sunt; deinde ponderis: leues et graues sunt; deinde coloris: purae sunt, turbidae, caeruleae, luridae, deinde salubritatis: sunt enim utiles, sunt mortiferae, sunt quae cogantur in lapidem, quaedam tenues, quaedam pingues; quaedam alunt, quaedam sine ulla bibentis ope transeunt, quaedam haustae fecunditatem afferunt.

[2,2] They have, moreover, many discriminations, first of touch: cold and hot; then of weight: light and heavy; then of color: pure, turbid, cerulean, lurid; then of salubrity: for there are useful ones, mortiferous ones, some which are compelled into stone, some thin, some unctuous; some nourish, some pass through without any help to the drinker, some, when quaffed, bring fecundity.

[1] Ut stet aqua aut fluat, loci positio eficit: in deuexo fluit, in plano et defosso continetur et stagnat. Aliquando in aduersum spiritu impellitur: tunc cogitur, non fluit. Colligitur ex imbribus, ex suo fonte natiua est.

[1] Whether water stands or flows, the position of the place brings it about: on a declivity it flows,
on level and dug-out ground it is contained and stagnates. Sometimes it is driven against the slope by a wind:
then it is compelled, it does not flow. It is gathered from rains,
from its own fount it is native.

Nihil tamen prohibet eodem loco aquam colligi et nasci; quod in Fucino uidemus, in quem montes circumiecti, quicquid fudit pluuia, deriuant, sed et magnae in ipso latentesque uenae sunt: itaque etiam cum hiberni defluxere torrentes, faciem suam seruat.

Nothing, however, prohibits water in the same place both from being collected and from being born; which we see in Lake Fucinus, into which the surrounding mountains divert whatever the rain has poured, and there are also great and hidden veins in it: therefore even when the winter torrents have flowed down, it preserves its appearance.

[4,1] Primum ergo quaeramus quomodo ad continuandos fluminum cursus terra sufficiat, unde tantum aquarum exeat. Miramur, quod accessionem fluminum maria non sentiant; aeque mirandum est, quod detrimentum exeuntium terra non sentit. Quid est, quod illam aut sic impleuerit, ut praebere tantum ex recondito possit, aut subinde sic suppleat?

[4,1] First, therefore, let us ask how the earth may suffice to continue the courses of rivers, whence so great a quantity of waters issues. We marvel that the seas do not feel the accession of rivers; equally marvelous is it that the earth does not feel the detriment of the waters going out. What is it that has either thus filled it, so that it can furnish so much from its hidden store, or else thus continually supplies it?

Quamcumque rationem reddiderimus de flumine, eadem erit riuorum ac fontium.

Whatever account we shall have rendered about a river, the same will be for rivulets and fountains.

[5,1] Quidam iudicant terram quicquid aquarum emisit rursus accipere et ob hoc maria non crescere, quia quod influxit, non in suum uertunt sed protinus reddunt. Occulto enim itinere subit terras et palam uenit, secreto reuertitur, colaturque in transitu mare, quod per multiplices terrarum anfractus euerberatum amaritudinem ponit et prauitatem: in tanta soli uarietate saporem exuit et in sinceram aquam transit.

[5,1] Some judge that the earth receives back again whatever waters it has emitted, and on this account the seas do not increase, because what has flowed in they do not convert into their own substance but immediately render. For by a hidden route it goes under the lands and comes openly, it returns in secret; and in transit the sea is filtered, which, beaten through the manifold anfractuosities of the lands, lays aside bitterness and pravity: in so great a variety of soil it sheds its savor and passes into pure water.

[6,1] Quidam existimant, quicquid ex imbribus terra concepit, id illam rursus emittere et hoc argumenti loco ponunt, quod paucissima flumina in his sunt locis, quibus rarus est imber.

[6,1] Some esteem that whatever from showers the earth has conceived,
it sends forth again, and they set this as a ground of argument,
that very few rivers are in those places where showers are rare.

[6,2] Ideo siccas aiunt Aethiopiae solitudines esse paucosque inueniri in interiore Africa fontes, quia feruida natura caeli sit et paene semper aestiua; squalidae itaque sine arbore, sine cultore harenae iacent raris imbribus sparsae, quos statim combibunt. At contra constat Germaniam Galliamque et proxime ab illis Italiam abundare fluminibus et riuis, quia caelo umido utuntur et ne aestas quidem imbribus caret.

[6,2] Therefore they say the solitudes of Ethiopia are dry and that few springs are found in inner Africa, because the nature of the sky is fervid and almost always estival; thus the sands, squalid, without tree, without cultivator, lie, scattered with infrequent rains, which they straightway imbibe. But on the contrary it is established that Germany and Gaul, and closest to them Italy, abound in rivers and rivulets, because they enjoy a humid sky and not even summer lacks rains.

[7,1] Aduersus hoc multa posse dici uides. Primum ego tibi uinearum diligens fossor affirmo nullam pluuiam esse tam magnam, quae terram ultra decem in altitudinem pedes madefaciat; omnis umor intra primam crustam consumitur nec in inferiora descendit:

[7,1] Against this you see that many things can be said. First, I, a diligent digger of vineyards, affirm to you that no rainfall is so great as to moisten the earth beyond ten feet in depth; all humor is consumed within the first crust and does not descend to the lower parts:

[7,2] quomodo ergo imber suggerere potest amnibus uires, qui summam humum tinguit? Pars maior eius per fluminum alueos in mare aufertur; exiguum est quod sorbeat terra, nec id seruat: aut enim arida est et absumit in se quicquid infusum est, aut satiata, si quid supra desiderium cecidit, excludit, et ideo primis imbribus non augentur amnes, quia totos in se terra sitiens trahit.

[7,2] how therefore can a rain-shower supply
strength to rivers, which wets only the topmost soil? The greater part of it
is carried off into the sea through the channels of rivers; exiguous is what the earth
drinks in, nor does it keep that: for either it is dry and consumes into itself whatever
has been infused, or, when sated, if anything has fallen beyond its desire,
it shuts it out, and therefore at the first rains the rivers are not augmented, because wholly
into itself the thirsty earth draws them.

[7,3] Quid, quod quaedam flumina erumpunt saxis et montibus? His quid conferent pluuiae, quae per nudas rupes deferuntur nec habent terram, cui insidant? Adice quod siccissimis locis putei in altum acti ultra ducentorum aut trecentorum pedum spatium inueniunt aquarum uberes uenas in ea altitudine, in quam aqua non penetrat, ut scias illic non caelestem esse nec collecticium umorem, sed, quod dici solet, uiuam aquam.

[7,3] What of the fact that certain rivers
erupt from rocks and mountains? What will rains confer upon these, which
are borne down over naked crags and have no earth on which they may settle?
Add that in the driest places wells driven deep beyond a span of 200
or 300 feet find rich veins of water at that depth into which water does not penetrate, so that you may know
that there the moisture is neither celestial nor collected, but, as it is
wont to be said, living water.

[7,4] Illo quoque argumento haec opinio refellitur, quod quidam fontes in summo montis cacumine redundant: apparet illos sursum agi aut ibi concipi, cum omnis pluuialis aqua decurrat.

[7,4] By that argument too this opinion is refuted,
that certain springs overflow on the very summit of a mountain:
it appears that they are driven upward or conceived there, since all pluvial
water runs down.

[8,1] Quidam existimant, quemadmodum in exteriore parte terrarum uastae paludes iacent magnique et nauigabiles lacus, quemadmodum ingenti spatio maria porrecta sunt infusa uallibus, sic interiora terrarum abundare aquis dulcibus nec minus illas late stagnare quam apud nos oceanum et sinus eius, immo eo latius, quo plus terra in altum patet. Ergo ex illa profunda copia isti amnes egeruntur: quos quid miraris, si terra detractos non sentit, cum adiectos maria non sentiant?

[8,1] Some think that, just as on the exterior part of the lands vast marshes lie and great and navigable lakes, just as over an immense expanse the seas are outstretched, poured into valleys, so the interiors of the lands abound in fresh waters, and that they stagnate no less widely than with us the ocean and its bays—nay, more widely, in proportion as the earth stretches farther into the deep. Therefore from that profound store these rivers are driven forth: which why do you marvel at, if the earth does not feel them taken away, when the seas do not feel additions?

[9,1] Quibusdam haec placet causa: aiunt habere terram intra se recessus cauos et multum spiritus, qui necessario frigescit umbra graui pressus, deinde piger et immotus in aquam, cum se desiit ferre, conuertitur: quemadmodum supra nos mutatio aeris imbrem facit, ita infra terras flumen aut riuum;

[9,1] To some this cause is pleasing: they say the earth has within itself hollow recesses and much spirit, which of necessity grows cold, pressed by heavy shadow, then, sluggish and motionless, when it ceases to bear itself, is converted into water: just as above us a mutation of the air makes rain, so beneath the earth a river or a rivulet;

[9,2] supra nos non potest stare segnis diu et grauis (aliquando enim sole tenuatur, aliquando uentis expanditur, itaque interualla magna imbribus sunt), sub terra uero quicquid est, quod illum in aquam conuertat, idem semper est, umbra perpetua, frigus aeternum, inexercitata densitas; semper ergo praebebit fonti aut flumini causas.

[9,2] above us the sluggish and heavy [air] cannot stay long (for sometimes it is attenuated by the sun, sometimes it is expanded by the winds, and so the intervals between rains are great), but under the earth whatever there is that converts it into water is always the same, perpetual shadow, eternal cold, unexercised density; therefore it will always provide causes for a spring or a river.

[9,3] Placet nobis terram esse mutabilem. Haec quoque quicquid efflauit, quia non libero aere concipitur, crassescit protinus et in umorem conuertitur: habes primam aquarum sub terra nascentium causam.

[9,3] It pleases us that the earth is mutable. This too,
whatever it exhales, because it is not conceived in free air, straightway
thickens and is converted into moisture: you have the first cause of waters under the earth
being born.

[10,1] Adicias etiam licet quod fiunt omnia ex omnibus, ex aqua aer, ex aere aqua, ignis ex aere, ex igne aer: quare ergo non ex terra fiat aqua? quae si in alia mutabilis, est etiam in aquam, immo maxime in hanc: utraque enim cognata res est, utraque grauis, utraque densa, utraque in extremum mundi compulsa. Ex aqua terra fit: cur non aqua fiat e terra?

[10,1] You may also add that all things are made from all things, from water, air; from air, water; fire from air; from fire, air: why therefore should not water be made from earth? Which, if it is mutable into other things, is also into water, nay rather most especially into this: for both are a cognate thing, both heavy, both dense, both driven to the extremity of the world. From water earth is made: why should not water be made from earth?

[10,2] At magna flumina sunt. Cum uideris quanta sint, rursus ex quanto prodeant adspice. Miraris, cum labantur assidue, quaedam uero concitata rapiantur, quod praesto sit illis aqua semper noua: quid, si mireris, quod, cum uenti totum aera impellant, non deficit spiritus sed per dies noctesque aequaliter fluit, nec (ut flumina) certo alueo fertur sed per uastum caeli spatium lato impetu uadit?

[10,2] But there are great rivers. When you have seen how great they are, look again at how great a source they come forth from. You marvel, although they glide continually, and some indeed, when stirred, are snatched along, that there is for them always ever-new water at hand: what then, if you marvel that, although the winds drive the whole air, the breath does not fail but flows equally through days and nights, and neither (as rivers) is it borne in a fixed channel but goes through the vast expanse of the heaven with broad impetus?

Quid, si ullam undam superesse mireris, quae superueniat tot fluctibus fractis?

What, if you marvel that any wave survives, which supervenes upon so many fractured billows?

[10,3] Nihil deficit quod in se redit: omnium elementorum alterni recursus sunt; quicquid alteri perit, in alterum transit, et natura partes suas uelut in ponderibus constitutas examinat, ne portionum aequitate turbata mundus praeponderet.

[10,3] Nothing fails that returns into itself: all the elements have reciprocal returns; whatever perishes to one passes into another, and Nature balances her parts as if set in scales, lest, with the equality of the portions disturbed, the world should preponderate.

[10,4] Omnia in omnibus sunt: non tantum aer in ignem transit sed numquam sine igne est (detrahe illi calorem: rigescet, stabit, durabitur); transit aer in umorem sed nihilominus non sine umore est; et aera et aquam facit terra sed non magis umquam sine aqua est quam sine aere. Et ideo facilior est inuicem transitus, quia illis, in quae transeundum est, iam mixta sunt.

[10,4] All things are in all things: not only does air pass into fire, but it is never without fire (take away its heat: it will grow stiff, it will stand still, it will be hardened); air passes into moisture, yet nonetheless it is not without moisture; and earth makes both air and water, but it is no more ever without water than without air. And therefore the passage into one another is easier, because they are already mixed with the things into which they must pass.

[10,5] Habet ergo terra umorem, hunc exprimit; habet aera, hunc umbra hiberni frigoris densat, ut faciat umorem; ipsa quoque mutabilis est in umorem: natura sua utitur.

[10,5] Therefore the earth has moisture, this it expresses; it has air,
this the shadow of wintry cold condenses, so as to make moisture; it itself also
is mutable into moisture: it uses its own nature.

[11,1] Quid ergo?, inquit, si perpetuae sunt causae, quibus flumina oriuntur ac fontes, quare aliquando siccantur, aliquando quibus non fuerunt locis exeunt? Saepe motu terrarum itinera turbantur et ruina interscindit cursum aquis, quae retentae nouos exitus quaerunt et aliquo impetum faciunt aut ipsius quassatione terrae aliunde alio transferuntur.

[11,1] What then?, he says, if the causes are perpetual by which
rivers and springs arise, why do they sometimes dry up, sometimes
issue in places where they were not? Often by the movement of the earth their routes
are disturbed, and a ruin cuts across the course for the waters, which, being held back,
seek new outlets and make an impulse somewhere, or by the very
concussion of the earth are transferred from one place to another.

[11,2] Apud nos solet euenire, ut amisso canali suo flumina primum refundantur, deinde quia perdiderunt uiam faciant. Hoc ait accidisse Theophrastus in Coryco monte, in quo post terrarum tremorem noua uis fontium emersit.

[11,2] Among us it is wont to occur that, with their own canal lost, rivers at first are driven back, then, since they have lost their way, they make one. Theophrastus says that this happened on Mount Corycus, on which, after an earthquake, a new force of springs emerged.

[11,3] Sicut alias quoque causas interuenire opinatur, quae aliter euocent aquas aut cursu suo deiciant et auertant; fuit aliquando aquarum inops Haemus, sed cum Gallorum gens a Cassandro obsessa in illum se contulisset et suas cecidisset, ingens aquarum copia apparuit, quas uidelicet in alimentum suum nemora ducebant; quibus euersis umor, qui desiit in arbusta consumi, superfusus est.

[11,3] Just as he also supposes other causes to intervene, which otherwise evoke the waters or cast them down from their course and avert them; Haemus was at one time destitute of waters, but when a nation of the Gauls, besieged by Cassander, had betaken themselves into it and had cut down their own (woods), a huge supply of waters appeared, which evidently the groves were drawing into their aliment; these overthrown, the moisture, which ceased to be consumed in the tree-plantings, was poured over.

[11,4] Idem ait et circa Magnesiam accidisse. Sed pace Theophrasti dixisse liceat: non est hoc simile ueri, quia fere aquosissima sunt quaecumque umbrosissima; quod non eueniret, si aquas arbusta siccarent, quibus alimentum ex proximo est (fluminum uero uis ex intimo manat ultraque concipitur quam radicibus euagari licet). Deinde succisae arbores plus umoris desiderant: non enim tantum id, quo uiuant, sed quo crescant trahunt.

[11,4] The same says it also happened around Magnesia. But with the leave of Theophrastus let it be said: this is not like to the truth, because as a rule the most watery are whatever are the most shady; which would not come to pass, if groves dried up the waters, for whom the aliment is from close at hand (but the force of rivers issues from the inmost and is gathered from farther beyond than roots are allowed to wander ). Then, trees that have been cut back require more moisture: for they draw not only that by which they live, but that by which they grow.

[11,5] Idem ait circa Arcadiam, quae urbs in Creta insula fuit, fontes et riuos substitisse, quia desierit coli terra diruta urbe, postea uero quam cultores receperit, aquas quoque recepisse. Causam siccitatis hanc ponit, quod obduruerit constricta tellus nec potuerit imbres inagitata transmittere. Quomodo ergo plurimos uidemus in locis desertissimis fontes?

[11,5] The same man says that around Arcadia, which city was on the island of Crete, the fountains and rivulets came to a standstill, because the land ceased to be cultivated with the city torn down; afterwards, however, when it had received back cultivators, it received back waters as well. He posits this as the cause of the drought: that the constricted earth had hardened and, being unstirred, could not transmit the rains. How then do we see very many fountains in the most deserted places?

[11,6] Plura denique inuenimus, quae propter aquas coli coeperunt quam quae aquas habere coeperint, quia colebantur. Non esse enim pluuialem hanc, quae uastissima flumina a fonte statim magnis apta nauigiis defert, ex hoc intellegas licet, quod per hiemem aestatemque par est a capite deiectus. Pluuia potest facere torrentem, non potest amnem aequali inter ripas suas tenore labentem, quem non faciunt imbres sed incitant.

[11,6] Finally, we find more places which began to be cultivated on account of waters
than those which began to have waters because they were cultivated.
For that this is not pluvial—that which carries down from the source
very vast rivers immediately fit for large vessels—you may understand from this, that
the discharge from the headwaters is equal in winter and in summer. Rain can
make a torrent; it cannot make a river gliding with equal tenor between its banks,
which the showers do not make, but incite.

[12,1] Paulo repetamus hoc altius, si uidetur, et scies te non habere quod quaeras, cum ad ueram amnium originem accesseris. Flumen nempe facit copia cursusque aquae perennis. Ergo quaeris a me quomodo aqua fiat: interrogabo inuicem quomodo aer fiat aut terra.

[12,1] Let us take this up again a little more deeply, if it seems, and you will know that you have nothing to inquire after, when you shall have approached the true origin of rivers. A river, surely, is made by an abundance and the course of perennial water. Therefore you ask me how water comes to be: I will in turn interrogate how air or earth comes to be.

[12,2] Sed si in rerum natura elementa sunt quattuor, non potes interrogare unde aqua sit: quarta enim pars naturae est. Quid ergo miraris, si rerum naturae tam magna portio potest aliquid ex se semper effundere?

[12,2] But if in the nature of things the elements
are four, you cannot interrogate whence water is: the fourth
indeed part of nature it is. Why then do you marvel, if of the nature of things so
great a portion can always pour forth something out of itself?

[12,3] Quomodo aer, et ipse quarta pars mundi, uentos et auras mouet, sic aqua riuos et flumina: si uentus est fluens aer, et flumen est fluens aqua. Satis et multum illi uirium dedi, cum dixi: "elementum est": intellegis quod ab illo proficiscitur non posse deficere.

[12,3] Just as air—also itself a fourth part of the world—moves winds and breezes,
so water moves streams and rivers: if wind is flowing air, then a river
is flowing water. I have given it strength enough and to spare when I said, "it is an element":
you understand that what proceeds from it cannot fail.

[13,1] Adiciam, ut Thales ait, "ualentissimum elementum est." Hoc fuisse primum putat, ex hoc surrexisse omnia. Sed nos quoque aut in eadem sententia aut in uicinia eius sumus: dicimus enim ignem esse qui occupet mundum et in se cuncta conuertat, hunc euanidum languentemque considere et nihil relinqui aliud in rerum natura igne restincto quam umorem, in hoc futuri mundi spem latere:

[13,1] I will add, as Thales says, "the strongest element
is." He thinks this to have been first, that from this all things have arisen. But we
too are either in the same opinion or in its vicinity: for we say that there is a fire
which occupies the world and converts all things into itself, that this, becoming
evanescent and languishing, subsides, and that nothing else is left in the nature of
things, the fire having been quenched, than moisture; in this lies hidden the hope of the
world to come:

[13,2] ita ignis exitus mundi est, umor primordium. Miraris ex hoc posse amnes semper exire, qui pro omnibus fuit et ex quo sunt omnia? Hic umor in diductione rerum ad quartas redactus est, sic positus, ut sufficere fluminibus edendis, ut riuis, ut fontibus posset.

[13,2] thus fire is the exit of the world, moisture the beginning. Do you marvel that from this the rivers are able always to issue, which was for all things and from which all things are? This moisture, in the separation of things, was reduced to fourths, so placed that it could suffice for bringing forth rivers, and for rills, and for springs.

[14,1] Quae sequitur Thaletis inepta sententia est. Ait enim terrarum orbem aqua sustineri et uehi more nauigii mobilitateque eius fluctuare tunc, cum dicitur tremere: non est ergo mirum, si abundat umor ad flumina profundenda, cum mundus in umore sit totus.

[14,1] What follows is Thales’s inept opinion. For he says
that the orb of the lands is sustained by water and is carried like a ship, and by its mobility
it fluctuates then, when it is said to tremble: therefore it is not a marvel,
if moisture abounds for the pouring forth of rivers, since the world
is wholly in moisture.

[14,2] Hanc ueterem et rudem sententiam explode: nec est quod credas in hunc orbem aquam subire per rimas et facere sentinam. Aegyptii quattuor elementa fecerunt, deinde ex singulis bina paria: aera marem iudicant qua uentus est, feminam qua nebulosus et iners; aquam uirilem uocant mare, muliebrem omnem aliam; ignem uocant masculum, qua ardet flamma, et feminam, qua lucet innoxius tactu; terram fortiorem marem uocant, saxa cautesque, feminae nomen assignant huic tractabili et cultae.

[14,2] Explode this old and rough opinion: nor is there reason for you to believe that into this sphere water goes up through cracks and makes a bilge. The Egyptians made four elements, then from each they made two paired forms: they judge air male where it is wind, female where it is nebulous and inert; they call water virile, the sea, feminine, every other; they call fire masculine where flame burns, and feminine where it shines harmless to the touch; they call the stronger earth male—the rocks and crags—and they assign the name of female to this tractable and cultivated one.

[14,3] Mare unum est, ab initio scilicet ita constitutum; habet suas uenas, quibus impletur atque aestuat. Quomodo maris sic et huius aquae mitioris uasta in occulto uis est, quam nullius fluminis cursus exhauriet. Abdita est uirium ratio: tantum ex illa, quantum semper fluere <pos>sit, emittitur.

[14,3] The sea is one, namely constituted thus from the beginning; it has its own veins, by which it is filled and heaves. Just as with the sea, so also this milder water has a vast force in hiding, which no river’s course will exhaust. The rationale of the forces is hidden: from it only so much is emitted as can always flow.

[15,1] Quaedam ex istis sunt, quibus assentire possumus. Sed hoc amplius censeo: placet natura regi terram et quidem ad nostrorum corporum exemplar, in quibus et uenae sunt et arteriae, illae sanguinis, hae spiritus receptacula. In terra quoque sunt alia itinera per quae aqua, alia per quae spiritus currit; adeoque ad similitudinem illa humanorum corporum natura formauit, ut maiores quoque nostri aquarum appellauerint uenas.

[15,1] Certain of these are such as we can assent to. But I judge this further: it pleases that the earth be ruled by nature, and indeed according to the exemplar of our bodies, in which both veins exist and arteries, those receptacles of blood, these of spirit. In the earth also there are other pathways along which water runs, others along which spirit runs; and to such a degree did nature fashion those things to the likeness of human bodies that our ancestors too called the veins of waters.

[15,2] Sed quemadmodum in nobis non tantum sanguis est sed multa genera umoris, alia necessarii, alia corrupti ac paulo pinguioris (in capite cerebrum, in ossibus medullae, muci saliuaeque et lacrimae et quiddam additum articulis, per quod citius flectantur ex lubrico), sic in terra quoque sunt umoris genera complura, quaedam quae mature durantur,

[15,2] But just as in us there is not only blood,
but many kinds of humor, some necessary, others corrupted and a little
fattier (in the head the brain, in the bones the medullae, the mucus and the saliva
and the tears, and a certain something added to the articulations, by which more quickly
they are bent by lubricity), so in the earth too there are several kinds of humor,
some which are promptly hardened,

[15,3] (hinc est omnis metallorum fructus, ex quibus petit aurum argentumque auaritia), et quae in lapidem ex liquore uertuntur; in quaedam uero terra umorque putrescunt, sicut bitumen et cetera huic similia. Haec est causa aquarum secundum legem naturae uoluntatemque nascentium.

[15,3] (hence is
all the fruit of metals, from which avarice seeks gold and silver),
and those which are converted into stone from liquid; but in certain
cases indeed earth and moisture putrefy, as bitumen and the rest
similar to this. This is the cause of waters coming-to-be according to the law of nature and the tendency of things being born.

[15,4] Ceterum, ut in nostris corporibus, ita in illa saepe umores uitia concipiunt: aut ictus aut quassatio aliqua aut loci senium aut frigus aut aestus corrupere naturam; et sulphuratio contraxit umorem, qui modo diuturnus est, modo breuis.

[15,4] Moreover, as in our bodies, so in it the humors often conceive vices: either a blow or some concussion, or the senility of the place, or cold or heat have corrupted its nature; and sulphuration has contracted the humor, which is now long-lasting, now brief.

[15,5] Ergo ut in corporibus nostris sanguis, cum percussa uena est, tam diu manat donec omnis effluxit aut donec uenae scissura subsedit atque iter elusit, uel aliqua alia causa retro dedit sanguinem, ita in terra solutis ac patefactis uenis riuus aut flumen effunditur.

[15,5] Therefore, just as in our bodies blood, when a vein has been struck,
so long emanates until all has flowed out or until the vein’s scissure
has settled and has foiled the passage, or some other cause has driven the blood back,
so in the earth, with veins loosened and made patent, a rivulet or a river is effused.

[15,6] Interest quanta aperta sit uena: quae modo consumpta aqua deficit, modo excaecatur aliquo impedimenta, modo coit uelut in cicatricem comprimitque quam perfecerat uiam; modo illa uis terrae, quam esse mutabilem diximus, desinit posse alimenta in umorem conuertere.

[15,6] It matters how widely the vein is opened: sometimes, when the water has been consumed, it fails; sometimes it is blinded by some impediment; sometimes it coalesces, as into a cicatrix, and compresses the way it had completed; sometimes that force of the earth, which we said is mutable, ceases to be able to convert aliments into moisture.

[15,7] Aliquando autem exhausta replentur modo per se uiribus recollectis, modo aliunde translatis: saepe enim inania apposita plenis umorem in se auocauerunt; saepe terra, si facilis est in tabem, ipsa soluitur et umescit; <saepe> idem euenit sub terra quod in nubibus, ut spissetur <aer> grauiorque, quam ut manere in natura sua possit, gignat umorem; saepe colligitur roris modo tenuis et dispersus liquor, qui ex multis in unum locis confluit (sudorem aquileges uocant, quia guttae quaedam uel pressura loci eliduntur uel aestu euocantur).

[15,7] Sometimes
however, when exhausted, they are refilled, now by themselves with their forces recollected, now
by things transferred from elsewhere: for often empty places set beside full have drawn moisture
into themselves; often the earth, if it is facile to putrescence, is itself dissolved
and becomes moist; <often> the same happens under the earth as in the clouds, such that
the <air> is thickened and, being heavier than to be able to remain in its own nature,
generates moisture; often a liquid, thin and dispersed in the manner of dew, is gathered,
which from many places flows together into one (the water-seekers call it “sweat,”
because certain drops are either squeezed out by the pressure of the place
or are called forth by heat).

[15,8] Haec tenuis unda uix fonti sufficit: et ex magnis caueis magnisque conceptibus excidunt amnes, nonnumquam leuiter emissi, si aqua pondere suo se tantum detulit, nonnumquam uehementer et cum sono, si illam spiritus intermixtus eiecit.

[15,8] This slender wave scarcely suffices for a spring: and from great caverns and great receptacles rivers are discharged, sometimes lightly sent forth, if the water by its own weight has only carried itself along, sometimes vehemently and with sound, if an intermixt spirit (air) has cast it out.

[16,1] Sed quare quidam fontes senis horis pleni senisque sicci sunt? Superuacuum est nominare singula flumina, quae certis mensibus magna certis angusta sunt, et occasionem singulis quaerere, cum possim eandem causam omnibus reddere.

[16,1] But why are certain springs for six hours full and for six dry? It is superfluous to nominate individual rivers which in certain months are great and in certain narrow, and to seek the occasion for each singly, since I can render the same cause for all.

[16,2] Quemadmodum quartana ad horam uenit, quemadmodum ad tempus podagra respondet, quemadmodum purgatio, si nihil obstitit, statum diem seruat, quemadmodum praesto est ad mensem suum partus, sic aquae interualla habent, quibus se retrahant et quibus redeant. Quaedam autem interualla minora sunt et ideo notabilia, quaedam maiora nec minus certa.

[16,2] Just as a quartan comes at the hour, just as podagra answers at the season, just as a purgation, if nothing has stood in the way, keeps its stated day, just as childbirth is at hand at its own month, so waters have intervals at which they withdraw and at which they return. And some intervals are smaller and therefore noticeable, some greater and no less certain.

[16,3] Ecquid hic mirum est, cum uideas ordinem rerum et naturam per constituta procedere? Hiems numquam aberrauit, aestas suo tempore incaluit, autumni uerisque, unde solet, facta mutatio est; tam solstitium quam aequinoctium suos dies rettulit.

[16,3] Is anything marvelous here, when you see the order of things and nature proceed through
constituted appointments? Winter has never strayed, summer has at its own
time grown hot; of autumn and of spring, as is its wont, a mutation
has been made; both the solstice and the equinox have brought back their own days.

[16,4] Sunt et sub terra minus nota nobis iura naturae sed non minus certa: crede infra quicquid uides supra. Sunt et illic specus uasti ingentesque recessus ac spatia suspensis hinc et inde montibus laxa; sunt abrupti in infinitum hiatus, qui saepe illapsas urbes receperunt et ingentem ruinam in alto condiderunt

[16,4] There are also under the earth laws of nature less known to us but no less certain: believe below whatever you see above. There too are caverns vast and enormous recesses, and spaces loosened with mountains suspended here and there; there are abrupt chasms to infinity, which have often received cities that slipped in and have buried enormous ruin in the deep.

[16,5] (haec spiritu plena sunt, nihil enim usquam inane est); et stagna obsessa tenebris et lacus ampli. Animalia quoque illis innascuntur, sed tarda et informia ut in aere caeco pinguique concepta et aquis torpentibus situ; pleraque ex his caeca ut talpae et subterranei mures, quibus deest lumen, quia superuacuum est; inde, ut Theophrastus affirmat, pisces quibusdam locis eruuntur.

[16,5] (these are full of spirit, for nothing anywhere is void); and
pools besieged by darkness and broad lakes. Animals too are born in them,
but slow and misshapen, as if conceived in blind and thick air
and in waters torpid from stagnation; most of these are blind, like moles
and subterranean mice, to which light is lacking, because it is superfluous;
thence, as Theophrastus affirms, fishes in certain places
are dug out.

[17,1] Multa hoc loco tibi in mentem ueniunt quibus urbane in re incredibili fabulae dicas, "non cum retibus aliquem nec cum hamis sed cum dolabra ire piscatum! Expecto ut aliquis in mari uenetur." Quid est autem quare non pisces in terram transeant, si nos maria transimus? Permutabimus sedes!

[17,1] Many things at this point come to your mind, with which you would, urbanely, in an incredible matter, say jests, "not with nets nor with hooks, but with a pickaxe, to go a‑fishing! I expect that someone will hunt in the sea." What, moreover, is there why fishes should not cross onto the land, if we cross the seas? We will exchange abodes!

[17,2] Hoc miraris accidere: quanto incredibiliora sunt opera luxuriae, quotiens naturam aut mentitur aut uincit? In cubili natant pisces, et sub ipsa mensa capitur qui statim transferatur in mensam: parum uidetur recens mullus, nisi qui in conuiuae manu moritur; uitreis ollis inclusi afferuntur et obseruatur morientium color, quem in multas mutationes mors luctante spiritu uertit; alios necant in garo et condiunt uiuos.

[17,2] You marvel that this happens: how much more incredible are the works of luxury, as often as it either feigns nature or conquers it? In the bed fish swim, and beneath the very table one is caught who is immediately transferred to the table: a mullet seems not fresh enough, unless it dies in the banqueter’s hand; enclosed in glass jars they are brought in and the color of the dying is observed, which death, with the breath struggling, turns into many changes; others they kill in garum and season alive.

[17,3] Hi sunt qui fabulas putant piscem uiuere posse sub terra et effodi, non capi! Quam incredibile illis uideretur, si audirent natare in garo piscem nec cenae causa occidi sed super cenam, cum multum in deliciis fuit et oculos ante quam gulam pauit?

[17,3] These are the people who think it a fable that a fish can live under the earth and be dug out, not caught! How incredible it would seem to them, if they were to hear of a fish swimming in garum and not killed for the sake of dinner but over the dinner, since it was much among the delicacies and fed the eyes before the gullet?

[18,1] Permitte mihi quaestione seposita castigare luxuriam. Nihil est, inquis, mullo expirante illis formosius: ipsa colluctatione animae deficientis rubor primum, deinde pallor subfunditur, squamaeque uariantur et <in> incertas facies inter uitam ac mortem coloris est uagatio. Languor somniculosae inertisque luxuriae quam<quam> sero experrectus circumscribi se et fraudari tanto bono sensit: hoc adhuc tam pulchro spectaculo piscatores fruebantur.

[18,1] Permit me, the question set aside, to chastise luxury. Nothing is, you say, to them more beautiful than a mullet expiring: by the very struggle of the failing soul a blush at first, then a pallor is suffused, and the scales are variegated, and the color wanders into uncertain appearances between life and death. The languor of drowsy and inert luxury, although awakened late, perceived itself to be circumscribed and defrauded of so great a good: up to this point so beautiful a spectacle the fishermen were enjoying.

[18,2] " Quo coctum piscem? quo exanimem? In ipso ferculo expiret." Mirabamur tantum illis inesse fastidium, ut nollent attingere nisi eodem die captum, qui, ut aiunt, saperet ipsum mare: ideo cursu aduehebatur, ideo gerulis cum anhelitu et clamore properantibus dabatur uia.

[18,2] " Where a cooked fish? where a lifeless one? Let it expire on the very platter." We marveled that such fastidiousness was in them, that they were unwilling to touch it unless caught the same day, which, as they say, tasted of the sea itself: therefore it was conveyed at a run, therefore way was given to the porters, hurrying with panting and shouting.

[18,3] Quo peruenere deliciae? Iam pro putrido his est piscis occisus. "Hodie eductus est." - "Nescio de re magna tibi credere: ipsi oportet me credere; huc afferatur, coram me animam agat." Ad hunc fastum peruenit uenter delicatorum, ut gustare non possint, nisi quem in ipso conuiuio natantem palpitantemque uiderunt: tantum ad sollertiam luxuriae pereuntis accedit, tantoque subtilius cotidie et elegantius aliquid excogitat furor usitata contemnens!

[18,3] To what have delicacies come? Now, for these people, a fish that has been killed counts as putrid. "It was brought out today." - "I do not know to believe you about so great a matter: it is necessary that I believe myself; let it be brought here, let it breathe out its spirit before me." To this haughtiness has the belly of the delicate come, that they cannot taste unless they have seen it swimming and palpitating at the banquet itself: so much is added to the cleverness of perishing luxury, and so much the more subtly and more elegantly each day does madness, contemning the usual things, devise something!

[18,4] Illa audiebamus: "Nihil est melius saxatili mullo," at nunc audimus: "Nihil est moriente formosius; da mihi in manus uitreum, in quo exsultet et trepidet." Ubi multum diuque laudatus est, ex illo perlucido uiuario extrahitur.

[18,4] We used to hear this: "Nothing is better than a rock‑dwelling mullet," but now we hear: "Nothing is more beautiful when dying; put into my hands a glass vessel, in which it may exult and quiver." When it has been much and long praised, it is drawn out from that pellucid vivarium.

[18,5] Tunc, ut quisque peritior est, monstrat: "Uide quomodo exarserit rubor omni acrior minio! uide quas per latera uenas agat! ecce sanguineum putes uentrem!

[18,5] Then, as each is more expert, he demonstrates: "See how the redness has blazed up
sharper than any minium! see what veins it drives along the sides! look,
you would think the belly blood-red!

quam lucidum quiddam caeruleumque sub ipso tempore effulsit! iam porrigitur et pallet et in unum colorem componitur."

how something lucid and cerulean flashed forth at that very moment! now it is stretched out and grows pale and into one color it is composed."

[18,6] Ex his nemo morienti amico assidet, nemo uidere mortem patris sui sustinet, quam optauit. Quotusquisque funus domesticum ad rogum prosequitur? Fratrum propinquorumque extrema hora deseritur; ad mortem mulli concurritur: "Nihil est enim illa formosius."

[18,6] Of these, no one sits beside a dying friend, no one
endures to see the death of his own father, which he had wished. How very few
escort a domestic funeral to the pyre? The final hour of brothers and kinsmen
is deserted; to death no one runs together: "For nothing is more beautiful than that."

[18,7] Non tempero mihi quin utar interdum temerarie uerbis et proprietatis modum excedam: non sunt ad popinam dentibus et uentre et ore contenti: oculis quoque gulosi sunt.

[18,7] I cannot refrain from sometimes using temerarious words and exceeding the measure of propriety: they are not, at the cookshop, content with teeth and belly and mouth: they are gluttons with their eyes as well.

[19,1] Sed ut ad propositum reuertar, accipe argumentum, magnam uira aquarum in subterraneis occuli fertilem foedorum situ piscium: si quando erupit, effert secum immensam animalium turbam, horridam aspici et turpem ac noxiam gustu.

[19,1] But, that I may return to the proposition, receive an argument: the great force of the waters in subterranean places conceals a fertile breeding-ground of fishes, befouled by foul mould; if ever it bursts forth, it carries out with it an immense throng of animals, horrid to behold and turpid and noxious to the taste.

[19,2] Certe cum in Caria circa Idymum urbem talis exiluisset unda, perierunt quicumque illos ederant pisces, quos ignoto ante eam diem caelo nouus amnis ostendit. Nec id mirum: erant enim pinguia et differta ut ex longo otio corpora, ceterum inexercitata et tenebris saginata et lucis expertia, ex qua salubritas ducitur.

[19,2] Certainly, when in Caria, around the city Idymus, such a wave had burst forth,
all perished who had eaten those fishes which a new river displayed, from a sky unknown before that day.
Nor is that a marvel: for they were fat and crammed, like bodies from long leisure, moreover unexercised and
fattened in darkness and unacquainted with light, from which salubrity is derived.

[19,3] Nasci autem posse pisces in illo terrarum profundo sit indicium, quod anguillae latebrosis locis nascuntur, grauis et ipsae cibus ob ignauiam, utique si altitudo illas luti penitus abscondit.

[19,3] Now that fishes can be born in that profundity of the earth has an indication, namely that eels are born in lurking places, and they themselves are a heavy food on account of sluggishness, especially if the depth of the mud utterly hides them.

[19,4] Habet ergo non tantum uenas aquarum terra, ex quibus conriuatis flumina effici possint, sed amnes magnitudinis uastae, quorum aliis semper in occulto cursus est, donec aliquo sinu terrae deuorentur, alii sub aliquo lacu emergunt. Nam quis ignorat esse quaedam stagna sine fundo? Quorsus hoc pertinet?

[19,4] Therefore the earth has not only veins of waters, from which, when conjoined,
rivers can be made, but rivers of vast magnitude, of which
some have their course always in occult, until they are devoured by some bosom of the earth,
others emerge beneath some lake. For who is ignorant
that there are certain pools without a bottom? To what does this pertain?

ut appareat hanc aquam magnis amnibus aeternam esse materiam, cuius non tanguntur extrema sicut fluminum fontes.

so that it may appear that this water is the eternal material for great rivers, whose extremities are not touched, just as the sources of rivers are.

[20,1] At quare aquis sapor uarius? Propter quattuor causas: ex solo prima est, per quod fertur; secunda ex eodem, si mutatione eius nascitur; tertia ex spiritu, qui in aquam transfiguratus est; quarta ex uitio, quod saepe concipiunt corruptae per iniuriam.

[20,1] But why is the savor of waters various? On account of four causes: the first is from the soil through which it is borne; the second from the same, if it is generated by its change; the third from the spirit, which has been transfigured into water; the fourth from defect, which they often conceive, having been corrupted through injury.

[20,2] Hae causae saporem dant aquis uarium, hae medicatam potentiam, hae grauera spiritum odoremque pestiferum, hae leuitatem grauitatemque, <hae> aut calorem aut nimium rigorem. Interest utrum loca sulphure an nitro an bitumine plena transierint; hac ratione corruptae cum uitae periculo bibuntur.

[20,2] These causes give to waters a various savor, these a medicated potency, these a heavier spirit and a pestiferous odor, these lightness and gravity, <these> either heat or excessive rigor. It matters whether they have passed through places full of sulphur or of nitre or of bitumen; corrupted in this way they are drunk with peril to life.

[20,3] Illinc illud, de quo Ouidius ait "flumen habent Cicones, quod potum saxea reddit uiscera, quod tactis inducit marmora rebus;" medicatum est et eius naturae habet limum, ut corpora adglutinet et obduret. Quemadmodum Puteolanus puluis, si aquam attigit, saxum est, sic e contrario haec aqua, si solidum tetigit, haeret et affigitur.

[20,3] From there that thing, about which Ovid says "the Ciconians have a river, which, when drunk, makes the viscera stony, which, when things are touched, lays on a marble coating;" it is medicated and has a mud of such a nature as to glue together and harden bodies. Just as Puteolan dust, if it has touched water, is stone, so on the contrary this water, if it has touched something solid, adheres and is affixed.

[20,4] Inde est quod res abiectae in Uelinum lacum lapideae subinde extrahuntur; quod in Italia quibusdam locis euenit: siue uirgam siue frondem demerseris, lapidem post paucos dies extrahis; circumfunditur enim corpori limus adliniturque paulatim. Hoc minus tibi uidebitur mirum, si notaueris Albulas et fere sulphuratam aquam circa canales suos riuosque durari.

[20,4] Hence it is that things thrown into Lake Velinus are presently drawn out stony; which happens in certain places in Italy: whether you submerge a twig or a frond, you draw out a stone after a few days; for slime spreads itself around the body and is gradually smeared on. This will seem less marvelous to you, if you note that the Albulae and an almost sulfurated water are hardened around their canals and rivulets.

[20,5] Aliam naturam habent [causam] illi lacus, "quos quisquis faucibus hausit", ut idem poeta ait, "aut furit aut patitur mirum grauitate soporem;" similem habent uim mero, sed uehementiorem (nam quemadmodum ebrietas, donec exsiccetur, dementia est et nimia grauitate defertur in somnum, sic huius aquae sulphurea uis habens quoddam acrius ex aere noxio uirus mentem aut furore mouet aut sopore opprimit).

[20,5] Those lakes have another nature [cause], "which whoever has quaffed with the gullet," as the same poet says, "either raves or undergoes a strange sleep by heaviness;" they have a power similar to pure wine, but more vehement (for just as ebriety, until it is dried out, is dementia and by excessive heaviness is borne down into sleep, so the sulfurous force of this water, having a certain keener poison from noxious air, either stirs the mind to fury or overwhelms it with sleep).

[20,6] Hoc habet mali "Lynceius amnis, quem quicumque parum moderato gutture traxit, haut aliter titubat, quam si mera uina bibisset."

[20,6] This has of evil
"The river Lynceius,
whoever has drawn it with a not sufficiently moderated throat,
staggers not otherwise than if he had drunk unmixed wine."

[21,1] In quosdam specus qui despexere, moriuntur; tam uelox malum est, ut transuolantes aues deiciat: talis est aer, talis locus, ex quo letalis aqua destillat. Quod si remissior fuit aeris et loci pestis, ipsa quoque temperatior noxa nihil amplius quam temptat neruos uelut ebrietate torpentes.

[21,1] In certain caverns, those who have looked down die; so swift is the evil that it casts down birds flying over: such is the air, such the place, from which lethal water distills. But if the pest of the air and of the place has been more remiss, the more tempered harm itself does nothing more than try the nerves, as if torpid with drunkenness.

[21,2] Nec miror, si locus atque aer aquas inficit similesque regionibus reddit, per quas et ex quibus ueniunt: pabuli sapor apparet in lacte, et uini uis existit in aceto. Nulla res est, quae non eius, quo nascitur, notas reddat.

[21,2] Nor do I marvel, if the place and the air taint the waters and render them similar to the regions through which and from which they come: the savor of the fodder appears in the milk, and the force of the wine exists in vinegar. There is nothing that does not render the marks of that from which it is born.

[22,1] Aliud est aquarum genus, quod nobis placet coepisse cum mundo: siue ille aeternus est, haec quoque fuit semper, siue initium aliquod est illi, haec quoque cum toto disposita est. Quae sit haec quaeris? Oceanus et quodcumque ex illo mare terras interluit.

[22,1] Another kind of waters there is, which it pleases us to have begun with the world: whether that is eternal, this too has always existed, or if it has some beginning, this too was disposed with the whole. What this is, you ask? The Ocean and whatever sea from it washes between the lands.

Iudicant quidam flumina quoque, quorum inenarrabilis natura est, cum ipso mundo traxisse principia, ut Histrum, ut Nilum, uastos amnes magisque insignes, quam ut dici possit eandem illis originem quam ceteris esse.

Some judge that rivers too, whose inenarrable nature it is, have drawn their beginnings with the world itself, such as the Hister, such as the Nile—vast streams and more distinguished—so that it cannot be said that they have the same origin as the others.

[23,1] Haec est ergo aquarum diuisio, ut quibusdam uidetur: prosiliunt ex superioribus caelestes, quas nubila excutiunt; ex terrenis aliae sunt ut ita dicam supernatantes, quae in summa humo repunt, aliae abditae, quarum reddita est ratio.

[23,1] This, then, is the division of waters, as it seems to some: the celestial ones spring forth from the upper regions, which the clouds shake out; from the terrestrial, some are, so to speak, supernatant, which creep on the topmost soil, others hidden, of which an account has been rendered.

[24,1] Quare quaedam aquae caleant, quaedam etiam ferueant in tantum, ut non possint esse usui, nisi aut in aperto euanuerunt aut mixtura frigidae intepuerunt, plures causae redduntur. Empedocles existimat ignibus, quos multis locis terra opertos tegit, aquam calescere, si subiecti sunt ei solo, per quod aquis transcursus est.

[24,1] Why certain waters grow warm, and certain even boil
to such a degree that they cannot be of use unless either in the open
they have evaporated away, or by a mixture with cold they have become tepid, several causes are given.
Empedocles holds that by fires, which in many places the earth,
overlaid, covers, water is heated, if they lie beneath that soil
through which there is a passage for the waters.

[24,2] Facere solemus dracones et miliaria et complures formas, in quibus aere tenui fistulas struimus per decliue circumdatas, ut saepe eundem ignem ambiens aqua per tantum fluat spatii, quantum efficiendo calori sat est: frigida itaque intrat, effluit calida.

[24,2] We are accustomed to make dracones and miliaria
and several forms, in which with thin bronze we build pipes
arranged around along a slope, so that water, often going around the same fire,
flows through as much space as is enough for producing heat: accordingly, cold
it enters, it flows out hot.

[24,3] Idem sub terra Empedocles existimat fieri, quem non falli crede Baianis, quibus balnearia sine igne calefiunt: spiritus in illa feruens loco aestuante infunditur; hic per tubos lapsus non aliter quam igne subdito parietes et uasa balnei calefacit, omnis denique frigida transitu mutatur in calidam nec trahit saporem e uaporario, quia clausa praelabitur.

[24,3] Empedocles thinks the same happens under the earth; believe that he is not mistaken from the Baian examples, where bathhouses are heated without fire: a fervent vapor is poured into them from a sweltering place; this, having slipped through pipes, heats the walls and the vessels of the bath no otherwise than with fire set beneath, and finally every cold water by its passage is changed into hot, nor does it draw a flavor from the vapor-room, because, enclosed, it glides past.

[24,4] Quidam existimant per loca sulphure plena uel nitro euntes aquas calorem beneficio materiae, per quam fluunt, trahere: quod ipso odore gustuque testantur; reddunt enim qualitatem eius, qua caluere, materiae. Quod ne accidere mireris, uiuae calci aquam infunde: feruebit.

[24,4] Some think that waters going through places full of sulphur or nitre draw heat by the agency of the material through which they flow: which they attest by the very odor and taste; for they render the quality of that matter by which they have grown warm. That you may not wonder that this happens, to quicklime pour water: it will boil.

[25,1] Quaedam aquae mortiferae sunt nec odore notabiles nec sapore. Circa Nonacrin in Arcadia Styx appellata ab incolis aduenas fallit, quia non facie, non odore suspecta est: qualia sunt magnorum artificum uenena, quae deprehendi nisi morte non possunt. Haec autem, de qua paulo ante rettuli, aqua summa celeritate corrumpit, nec remedio locus est, quia protinus hausta duratur, nec aliter quam gypsum sub umore constringtur et alligat uiscera.

[25,1] Certain waters are mortiferous and noticeable neither by odor nor by savor. Around Nonacris in Arcadia, a water called by the inhabitants the Styx deceives newcomers, because it is suspect neither by aspect nor by odor: such as are the poisons of great artificers, which cannot be apprehended except by death. This water, moreover, about which I reported a little before, corrupts with utmost speed, and there is no place for remedy, because, as soon as it is drunk, it is hardened, and, no otherwise than gypsum under moisture, it is constricted and binds the viscera.

[25,2] Est aeque a noxia aqua in Thessalia circa Tempe, quam et fera et pecus omne deuitat; per ferrum et aes exit, tanta uis illi est etiam dura mordendi; nec arbusta quidem ulla alit et herbas necat.

[25,2] There is likewise a noxious water in Thessaly around Tempe, which both the wild beast and all cattle shun; through iron and bronze it eats, so great is its mordant force even against the hard; nor indeed does it nourish any orchards, and it kills the grasses.

[25,3] Quibusdam fluminibus uis inest mira: alia enim sunt, quae pota inficiunt greges ouium intraque certum tempus, quae fuere nigra, albam ferunt lanam, quae albae uenerant, nigrae abeunt. Hoc in Boeotia amnes duo efficiunt, quorum alteri ab effectu Melas nomen est: uterque ex eodem lacu exeunt diuersa facturi.

[25,3] In certain rivers there is a marvelous power: for there are others which, when drunk, infect flocks of sheep, and within a fixed time those which had been black bear white wool, those that had come white go away black. This in Boeotia two rivers bring about, of which one from the effect has the name Melas: each goes out from the same lake, about to produce diverse results.

[25,4] In Macedonia quoque, ut ait Theophrastus, qui facere albas oues uolunt, <ad Haliacmonem> adducunt, quem ut diutius potauere, non aliter quam infectae mutantur; at si illis lana opus fuit pulla, paratus gratuitus infector est: ad Peneion eundem gregem appellunt. Auctores bonos habeo esse in Galatia flumen, quod idem in omnibus efficiat, esse in Cappadocia quo poto equis nec ulli praeterea animali color mutetur et spargatur albo cutis.

[25,4] In Macedonia too, as Theophrastus says, those who wish to make the sheep white lead them <to the Haliacmon>, and the longer they have drunk of it, they are changed just as if dyed; but if they had need of dusky wool, a ready gratuitous dyer is at hand: they drive the same flock to the Peneios. I have good authorities that in Galatia there is a river which effects the same in all; that in Cappadocia there is one, by drinking of which in horses—and in no other animal besides—the color is altered, and the skin is sprinkled with white.

[25,5] Quosdam lacus esse, qui nandi imperitos ferant, notum est: erat in Sicilia, est adhuc in Syria stagnum, in quo natant lateres et mergi proiecta non possunt, licet grauia sint. Huius rei palam causa est: quamcumque uis rem expende et contra aquam statue, dummodo utriusque par sit modus: si aqua grauior est, leuiorem rem, quam ipsa est, fert, et tanto supra se extollet quanto erit leuior; grauiora descendent. At si aquae et eius rei, quam contra pensabis, par pondus erit, nec pessum ibit nec extabit sed exaequabitur aquae et natabit quidem sed paene mersa ac nulla eminens parte.

[25,5] It is known that there are certain lakes which support those unskilled at swimming: there was
in Sicily, there is still in Syria a pool, in which bricks float and things thrown in cannot be submerged,
although they are heavy. The cause of this matter is plain:
weigh whatever thing you wish and set it over against water, provided that
the measure of each be equal: if the water is heavier, it bears the thing lighter
than itself, and it will lift it above itself by as much as it is lighter;
heavier things will descend. But if the weight of the water and of that thing which you will weigh against it
is equal, it will neither go to the bottom nor stand out, but will be equalized
with the water, and will indeed float, but almost submerged and with no part projecting.

[25,6] Hoc est cur quaedam tigna supra aquam paene tota efferantur, quaedam ad medium submissa sint, quaedam ad aequilibrium aquae descendant. Namque cum utriusque pondus par est, neutra res alteri cedit, grauiora descendunt, leuiora gestantur. Graue autem et leue est non aestimatione nostra, sed comparatione eius, quo uehi debet.

[25,6] This is why certain timbers are borne up almost wholly above the water,
certain are lowered to the middle, certain sink down to the equilibrium
of the water. For when the weight of each is equal,
neither thing yields to the other: the heavier descend, the lighter are carried.
But heavy and light are not by our estimation, but by a comparison
with that by which it ought to be conveyed.

[25,7] Itaque ubi aqua grauior est hominis corpore aut saxo, non sinit id, quo non uincitur, mergi: sic euenit, ut in quibusdam stagnis ne lapides quidem pessum eant. De solidis et duris loquor. Sunt enim multi pumicosi et leues, ex quibus quae constant insulae in Lydia, natant: Theophrastus est auctor.

[25,7] Therefore, where the water is heavier than a human body or a stone, it does not allow that which it is not overcome by to be submerged: thus it comes about that in certain pools not even stones go to the bottom. I speak of solid and hard things. For there are many pumiceous and light ones, and of these the islands in Lydia that consist of them float: Theophrastus is authority.

[25,8] Ipse ad Cutilias natantem insulam uidi, et alia in Uadimonis lacu uehitur (lacus in Statoniensi est). Cutiliarum insula et arbores habet et herbas nutrit: tamen aqua sustinetur et in hanc atque illam partem non uento tantum sed aura compellitur, nec umquam illi per diem ac noctem uno loco statio est: adeo mouetur leui flatu.

[25,8] I myself saw at Cutilias a floating island,
and another is borne on the lake of Vadimon (the lake is in the Statonian district).
The island at Cutilias both has trees and nourishes grasses: nevertheless it is sustained by the water and is driven this way and that not only by the wind but by a breeze,
nor at any time through day and night has it a station in one place: to such a degree is it moved by a light breath.

[25,9] Huic duplex causa est: aquae grauitas medicatae et ob hoc ponderosae, et ipsius insulae materia uectabilis, quae non est corporis solidi, quamuis arbores alat. Fortasse enim leues truncos frondesque in lacu sparsas pinguis umor apprehendit ac uinxit.

[25,9] To this there is a double cause: the gravity of the medicated, and on this account ponderous, water; and the island’s own material, buoyant, which is not of a solid body, although it nourishes trees. Perhaps indeed a rich humor has apprehended and bound light trunks and fronds scattered in the lake.

[25,10] Itaque etiam si qua in illa saxa sunt, inuenies exesa et fistulosa, qualia sunt quae duratus umor eficit, utique circa medicatorum fontium <ripas> riuosque, ubi purgamenta aquarum coaluerunt et spuma solidatur: necessario leue est quod ex uentoso inanique concretum est.

[25,10] Thus even if whatever rocks there are in it, you will find them eaten away and fistulous, such as are those which hardened moisture effects, especially around the banks of medicated springs <ripas> and rills, where the dregs of the waters have coalesced and the foam is solidified: of necessity light is that which has been concreted from windy and empty matter.

[25,11] Quorundam causa non potest reddi: quare aqua Nilotica fecundiores feminas faciat, adeo ut quarundam uiscera longa sterilitate praeclusa ad conceptum relaxauerit; quare quaedam in Lycia aquae conceptum feminarum custodiant, quas solent petere, quibus parum tenax uulua est. Quod ad me attinet, pono ista inter temere uulgata. Creditum est quasdam aquas scabiem afferre corporibus, quasdam uitiliginem et foedam ex albo uarietatem, siue infusa siue pota sit: quod uitium dicunt habere aquam ex rore collectam.

[25,11] The cause of certain things cannot be rendered: why Nilotic water
makes women more fecund, to such a degree that it has relaxed to conception the organs of some long shut by barrenness; why certain waters
in Lycia safeguard the conception of women, which are accustomed to be sought by those whose vulva is too little tenacious. As far as concerns me,
I place these among rashly circulated reports. It has been believed that certain waters bring scabies to bodies, others vitiligo and a foul variegation from white,
whether it be poured on or drunk: which defect they say water collected from dew has.

[25,12] Quis non grauissimas esse aquas credat, quae in crystallum coeunt? Contra autem est: tenuissimis enim hoc euenit, quas frigus ob ipsam tenuitatem facillime gelat. Unde autem fiat eiusmodi lapis, apud Graecos ex ipso nomine apparet: G-krustallon enim appellant aeque hunc perlucidum lapidem quam illam glaciem, ex qua fieri lapis creditur.

[25,12] Who would not believe waters to be most heavy,
which coalesce into crystal? On the contrary, however,
it is so: for this befalls the most tenuous, which the cold, on account of their very tenuity,
most easily freezes. And whence such a stone is produced appears among the Greeks from
the very name: for they call G-krustallon equally this pellucid stone as that ice,
from which the stone is believed to be made.

Aqua enim caelestis minimum in se terreni habens cum induruit, longioris frigoris pertinacia spissatur magis ac magis, donec omni aere excluso in se tota compressa est, et umor qui fuerat, lapis effectus est.

For celestial water, having in itself the least of the terrene, when it has hardened, by the pertinacity of more prolonged cold grows thicker and thicker, until, all air being shut out, it is compressed wholly into itself, and the moisture which it had been has been made a stone.

[26,1] Aestate quaedam flumina augentur ut Nilus, cuius alias ratio reddetur. Theophrastus est auctor in Ponto quoque quosdam amnes crescere tempore aestiuo. Quattuor esse iudicant causas: aut quia tunc maxime in umorem mutabilis terra sit, aut quia maiores in remoto imbres sint, quorum aqua per secretos cuniculos reddita tacite suffunditur.

[26,1] In summer certain rivers are augmented, like the Nile, whose rationale will be rendered elsewhere. Theophrastus is an authority that in Pontus too certain rivers increase in the estival season. They judge there to be four causes: either because then the earth is most mutable into moisture, or because in remote regions the rains are greater, the water of which, rendered back through secret tunnels, is silently suffused.

[26,2] Tertia, si crebrioribus uentis ostium caeditur et reuerberatus fluctu amnis resistit, qui crescere uidetur, quia non effunditur. Quarta siderum ratio est: haec enim quibusdam mensibus magis urgent et exhauriunt flumina; cum longius recesserunt, minus consumunt atque trahunt: ita quod impendio solebat, id incremento accidit.

[26,2] Third, if the mouth is battered by more frequent winds and, the wave being reverberated, the river is checked, which seems to grow because it is not poured out. Fourth is the rationale of the stars: for these in certain months press more and exhaust the rivers; when they have receded farther, they consume and draw less: thus what used to be by expenditure befalls as an increase.

[26,3] Quaedam flumina palam in aliquem specum decidunt et sic ex oculis auferuntur. Quaedam consumuntur paulatim et intercidunt; eadem ex interuallo reuertuntur recipiuntque et nomen et cursum. Causa manifesta est: sub terra uacat locus, omnis autem natura umor ad inferius et ad marie defertur.

[26,3] Certain rivers openly sink down into some cavern and thus are taken from sight. Certain ones are gradually consumed and vanish; the same, after an interval, return and recover both their name and their course. The cause is manifest: beneath the earth a place lies vacant, and all moisture by its nature is borne downward and to the sea.

Illo itaque recepta flumina cursus egere secreto, sed cum primum aliquid solidi quod obstaret occurrit, perrupta parte, quae minus ad exitum repugnauit, repetiere cursum suum.

Therefore, the rivers, once received there, drove their courses in secret; but as soon as some solid thing that would obstruct occurred, with the part broken through which resisted the exit less, they resumed their course.

[26,4] "Sic ubi terreno Lycus est potatus hiatu, existit procul hinc alioque renascitur ore. Sic modo combibitur, tacito modo gurgite lapsus redditur Argolicis ingens Erasinus in undis." Idem et in Oriente Tigris facit: absorbetur et desideratus diu tandem longe remoto loco, non tamen dubius an idem sit, emergit.

[26,4] "Thus, when the Lycus has been imbibed by an earthly chasm,
it appears far from here and is reborn with another mouth.
Thus now it is drunk in, now—having slipped in a silent whirlpool—
the mighty Erasinus is returned in the Argolic waves."
Likewise the Tigris too in the East does this: it is absorbed and, long desired,
at length in a place far removed, not, however, doubtful whether it is the same, it emerges.

[26,5] Quidam fontes certo tempore purgamenta eiectant, ut Arethusa in Sicilia quinta quaque aestate per Olympia. Inde opinio est Alpheon ex Achaia eo usque penetrare et agere sub mare cursum nec ante quam in Syracusano litore emergere, ideoque his diebus, quibus Olympia sunt, uictimarum stercus secundo traditum flumini illic redundare.

[26,5] Certain springs at a fixed time cast out their purgaments, as
Arethusa in Sicily every fifth summer during the Olympia. Thence
the opinion is that the Alpheus from Achaia penetrates so far and conducts its course under
the sea, nor emerges before on the Syracusan shore; and therefore on those days on which the Olympia are,
the dung of the victims, committed downstream to the river,
surges back there.

[26,6] Hoc et a te creditum est, ut in prima parte <dixi>, Lucili carissime, et a Uergilio, qui alloquitur Arethusam: "sic tibi, cum fluctus subter labere Sicanos, Doris amara suas non intermisceat undas." Est in Chersoneso Rhodiorum fons, qui post magnum interuallum temporis foeda quaedam turbidus ex intimo fundat, donec liberatus eliquatusque est.

[26,6] This too has been believed by you, as in the first part <I said>, dearest Lucilius, and by Vergil, who addresses Arethusa:
"so for you, when you glide beneath the Sicilian billows,
may bitter Doris not intermingle her waves with your own."
There is in the Chersonese of the Rhodians a spring which, after a great interval of time, turbid, pours out certain foul things from the innermost depths, until it is freed and eliquated.

[26,7] Hoc quibusdam locis fontes faciunt, ut non tantum lutum sed folia testasque et quicquid putre iacuit expellant. Ubique autem facit mare, cui haec natura est, ut omne immundum stercorosumque litoribus impingat. Quaedam uero partes maris certis temporibus hoc faciunt, ut circa Messenen et Mylas fimo quiddam simile turbulenta uis maris profert feruetque et aestuat non sine colore foedo, unde illic stabulare Solis boues fabula est.

[26,7] This in certain places springs do, namely that they expel not only mud but leaves and potsherds and whatever has lain putrid. Everywhere, however, the sea does it, whose nature is to drive all that is unclean and stercorous onto the shores. Some parts of the sea indeed do this at fixed times, as around Messene and Mylae, where the turbulent force of the sea brings forth something like dung and seethes and surges, not without a foul color, whence the tale is that the cattle of the Sun stable there.

[26,8] Sed difficilis ratio est quorundam, utique ubi tempus eius rei, de qua quaeritur, inobseruatum incertum est. Itaque proxima quidem inueniri et uicina non potest causa; ceterum publica est illa: omnis aquarum stantium clausarumque natura se purgat. Nam in his, quibus cursus est, non possunt uitia consistere, quae secunda uis defert et exportat; illae, quae non emittunt quicquid insedit, magis minusue aestuant.

[26,8] But the rationale of certain things is difficult,
especially where the time of the matter about which inquiry is made has been unobserved
and is uncertain. Therefore the proximate and adjacent cause indeed cannot be found; but there is that common one: the nature of all
standing and enclosed waters purges itself. For in those which
have a course, impurities cannot settle, which the favorable force of the current carries along
and exports; those which do not emit whatever has settled in seethe
more or less.

Mare uero cadauera stramentaque et naufragorum reliqua similia ex intimo trahit, nec tantum tempestate fluctuque sed tranquillum quoque placidumque purgatur.

The sea, in truth, draws cadavers, straw, and similar relics of shipwrecks out of its inmost depths, and it is cleansed not only by tempest and wave but when tranquil and placid as well.

[27,1] Sed monet me locus, ut quaeram, cum fatalis dies diluuii uenerit, quemadmodum magna pars terrarum undis obruatur: utrum oceani uiribus fiat et externum in nos pelagus exurgat, an crebri sine intermissione imbres et elisa aestate hiems pertinax immensam uim aquarum ruptis nubibus deiciat, an flumina tellus largius fundat aperiatque fontes nouos, an non sit una tanto malo causa sed omnis ratio consentiat et simul imbres cadant, flumina increscant, maria sedibus suis excita procurrant et omnia uno agmine ad exitium humani generis incumbant.

[27,1] But the place warns me to inquire, when the fated day of the deluge shall have come, how a great part of the lands is overwhelmed by the waves: whether it be done by the forces of the Ocean and the outer sea rise up against us, or frequent rains without intermission and, summer struck down, a stubborn winter hurl down an immense force of waters, the clouds being rent, or the earth more copiously pour forth rivers and open new springs, or there be not a single cause for so great an evil but every agency concur, and at once the rains fall, the rivers increase, the seas, stirred from their seats, run forward, and all in one column bear down upon the destruction of the human race.

[27,2] Ita est: nihil difficile naturae est, utique ubi in finem sui properat. Ad originem rerum parce utitur uiribus dispensatque se incrementis fallentibus; subito ad ruinam toto impetu uenit. Quam longo tempore opus est, ut conceptus ad puerperium perduret infans, quantis laboribus tener educatur, quam diligenti nutrimento obnoxium nouissime corpus adolescit!

[27,2] It is so: nothing is difficult for Nature, particularly when she hastens to her own end. At the origin of things she uses her forces sparingly and dispenses herself in imperceptible increments; suddenly, toward ruin, she comes with total impetus. How long a time is required, that the conceived child may endure to childbirth; by what great labors the tender one is reared; with what diligent nourishment the body, still liable, at last grows to adolescence!

At quam nullo negotio soluitur! Urbes constituit aetas, hora dissoluit; momento fit cinis, diu silua; magna tutela stant ac uigent omnia, cito ac repente dissiliunt.

But how with no trouble it is dissolved! An age establishes cities, an hour dissolves them; in a moment it becomes ash, a forest is long in the making; under great guardianship all things stand and thrive, quickly and suddenly they burst asunder.

[27,3] Quicquid ex hoc statu rerum natura flexerit, in exitium mortalium satis est. Ergo cum affuerit illa necessitas temporis, multas simul fata causas mouent. Neque enim sine concussione mundi tanta mutatio est, ut quidam putant, inter quos Fabianus est.

[27,3] Whatever nature bends aside from this state of things is enough for the destruction of mortals. Therefore, when that necessity of time has been present, the fates move many causes at once. For indeed there is not so great a mutation without a concussion of the world, as some think, among whom is Fabianus.

[27,4] Primo immodici cadunt imbres et sine ullis solibus triste nubilo caelum est nebulaque continua et ex umido spissa caligo numquam exiccantibus uentis. Inde uitium satis est, segetum sine fruge surgentium marcor. Tunc corruptis quae seruntur manu, palustris omnibus campis herba succrescit.

[27,4] First, immoderate
rains fall and, without any sunshine, there is a gloomy, nubilous sky,
and a continuous nebula, and from the damp a thick, caliginous murk, the winds never desiccating.
Then there is blight enough—the marcidity of crops rising without grain.
Then, with what is sown by hand corrupted, palustrine
grass upgrows in all the fields.

[27,5] Mox iniuriam et ualidiora sensere: solutis quippe radicibus arbusta procumbunt, et uitis atque omne uirgultum non tenetur solo, quod molle fluidumque est. Iam nec gramina aut pabula laeta aquis sustinet. Fame laboratur et manus ad antiqua alimenta porrigitur: qua ilex est et quercus excutitur et quaecumque in arduis arbor commissura astricta lapidum stetit.

[27,5] Soon they felt the injury grow stronger: for with the roots loosened the orchards topple, and the vine
and every shrubbery is not held by the soil, which is soft and fluid.
Already neither the grasses nor fodders, luxuriant with waters, hold up. With famine one toils, and the hand is stretched out to ancient aliment: where
there is holm oak and oak, they are shaken, and whatever tree on steep places
has stood fast, bound by the joining of stones.

[27,6] Labant ac madent tecta, et in imum usque receptis aquis fundamenta desidunt ac tota humus stagnat. Frustra titubantium fultura temptatur; omne enim firmamentum in lubrica figitur et lutosa humo; nihil stabile est.

[27,6] The roofs totter and are sodden, and with the waters received all the way down to the bottom the foundations sink down and the whole ground stagnates. In vain is the shoring of the tottering structures attempted; for every support is fixed in slippery and muddy soil; nothing is stable.

[27,7] Postquam magis magisque ingruunt nimbi et congestae saeculis tabuerunt niues, deuolutus torrens altissimis montibus rapit siluas male haerentes et saxa resolutis remissa compagibus rotat, abluit uillas et intermixtos dominis greges deuehit, uulsisque minoribus tectis, quae in transitu abduxit, tandem in maiora uiolentus aberrat, urbes et implicitos trahit moenibus suis populos, ruinam an naufragium querantur incertos (adeo simul et quod opprimeret et quod mergeret uenit). Auctus deinde processu aliis quoque in se torrentibus raptis plana passim populatur; nouissime [in] materia magna gentium elatus onustusque diffunditur.

[27,7] After the storm-clouds press in more and more and the snows heaped up for ages have melted away, a torrent rolled down from the loftiest mountains seizes forests ill-clinging, and whirls rocks, their joints loosened and released, washes over villas and carries off flocks intermingled with their masters, and, with the lesser roofs torn up, which in its passage it has borne away, at length violently strays into greater ones, drags cities and peoples entangled with their own walls, uncertain whether they should lament a ruin or a shipwreck (so much at once there came both what would crush and what would submerge). Then, increased in its course, with other torrents also swept into itself, it lays waste the plains everywhere; at the last, lifted up and burdened with a great mass of peoples, it is poured out.

[27,8] Flumina uero suapte natura uasta et tempestatibus rapida alueos reliquerunt. Quid tu esse Rhodanum, qui putas Rhenum atque Danuuim, quibus torrens etiam in canali suo cursus est, cum superfusi nouas sibi fecere ripas ac scissa humo simul excessere alueo?

[27,8] Indeed the rivers, by their very nature vast and, in tempests, swift, abandoned their channels. What, then, do you think the Rhone to be—you who reckon the Rhine and the Danube, whose course is torrential even in their own channel—when, having overflowed, they made new banks for themselves and, the soil being split, at once went out from their bed?

[27,9] Quanta cum praecipitatione uoluuntur, ubi per campestria fluens Rhenus ne spatio quidem languit, sed latissimas uelut per angustum aquas impulit; cum Danuuius non iam radices nec media montium stringit, sed iuga ipsa sollicitat ferens secum madefacta montium latera rupesque disiectas et magnarum promontoria regionum, quae fundamentis laborantibus a continenti recesserunt, deinde non inueniens exitum (omnia enim ipse sibi praecluserat), in orbem redit, ingentemque terrarum ambitum atque urbium uno uertice inuoluit.

[27,9] With what precipitancy they are whirled,
where, as it flows through the level plains, the Rhine did not even grow languid by breadth,
but drove the very broad waters as if through a narrow; when the Danube
no longer grazes the roots nor the middles of the mountains, but shakes the ridges themselves,
carrying with it the soaked flanks of the mountains and the shattered rocks and the promontories of great regions,
which, their foundations giving way, have withdrawn from the continent; then, not finding
an outlet (for it had barred everything to itself), it returns in a circle,
and with a single vortex wraps an immense circuit of lands and of cities.

[27,10] Interim permanent imbres, fit caelum grauius ac sic diu malum ex malo colligit: quod olim fuerat nubilum, nox est et quidem horrida ac terribilis intercursu luminis diri. Crebra enim micant fulmina, procellaeque quatiunt mare tunc primum auctum fluminum accessu et sibi angustum: iam enim promouet litus nec continetur suis finibus; sed prohibent exire torrentes aguntque fluctum retro. Pars tamen maior ut maligno ostio retenta restagnat et agros in formam unius laci redigit.

[27,10] Meanwhile the rains persist, the sky becomes heavier, and thus for a long time it gathers evil upon evil: what once had been cloudy is now night, and indeed a horrid and terrible one, with the interrunning of dire light. For frequent lightnings flash, and storms shake the sea, then for the first time increased by the access of the rivers and narrow to itself: for now it advances the shoreline and is not contained by its own bounds; but the torrents prevent it from going out and drive the surge back. Yet the greater part, as if retained by a malign mouth, stagnates and reduces the fields into the form of a single lake.

[27,11] Iam omnia, qua prospici potest, aquis obsidentur: omnis tumulus in profundo latet et immensa ubique altitudo est. Tantum in summis montium iugis uada sunt: in [ea] excelsissima cum liberis coniugibusque fugerunt actis ante se gregibus. Diremptum inter miseros commercium ac transitus, quoniam quicquid submissius erat, id unda compleuit.

[27,11] Now everything, as far as one can look out, is besieged by waters: every mound lies in the deep and there is immense depth everywhere. Only on the highest ridges of the mountains are there fords: into [those] most lofty they have fled with children and wives, their herds driven before them. Communication and passage among the wretched have been severed, since whatever was lower-lying, that the wave has filled.

[27,12] Editissimis quibusque adhaerebant reliquiae generis humani, quibus in extrema perductis hoc unum solacio fuit, quod transierat in stuporem metus. Non uacabat timere mirantibus, nec dolor quidem habebat locum, quippe uim suam perdit in eo, qui ultra sensum mali miser est.

[27,12] The remnants of the human race were adhering to the loftiest heights, and for them, brought to the last extremes, this one thing was a solace: that fear had passed over into stupor. There was no leisure to fear for those marveling, nor indeed did grief have a place, since it loses its force in one who is wretched beyond the sense of evil.

[27,13] Ergo insularum modo eminent "montes et sparsas Cycladas augent," ut ait ille poetarum ingeniosissimus egregie; sicut illud pro magnitudine rei dixit "omnia pontus erat, deerant quoque litora ponto," ni tantum impetum ingenii et materiae ad pueriles ineptias reduxisset: "nat lupus inter oues, fuluos uehit unda leones."

[27,13] Therefore, in the manner of islands the mountains stand out, "and augment the scattered Cyclades," as that most ingenious of poets says excellently; just as he said this in proportion to the magnitude of the matter, "all was sea, and even shores were lacking to the sea," if only he had not reduced so great an impetus of genius and material to puerile ineptitudes: "a wolf swims among the sheep, the wave carries tawny lions."

[27,14] Non est res satis sobria lasciuire deuorato orbe terrarum. Dixit ingentia et tantae confusionis imaginem cepit, cum dixit: "expatiata ruunt per apertos flumina campos, ... pressaeque labant sub gurgite turres." Magnifice haec, si non curauerit quid oues et lupi faciant. Natari autem in diluuio et in illa rapina potest?

[27,14] It is not a sufficiently sober matter to frolic, with the orb of the earth swallowed up. He spoke immensities and caught the image of so great a confusion, when he said: "having spread abroad the rivers rush through the open fields, ... and the towers, pressed down, totter beneath the whirlpool." These are magnificent, if he had not concerned himself with what sheep and wolves might be doing. But can there be swimming in a deluge and in that rapine?

aut non eodem impetu pecus omne, quo raptum erat, mersum est?

or was it not by the same impetus that the whole flock, which had been rapt, was submerged?

[27,15] Concepisti imaginem quantam debebas obrutis omnibus terris caelo ipso in terram ruente. Perfer: scies quid deceat, si cogitaueris orbem terrarum natare.

[27,15] You have conceived an image as great as you ought, with all the lands overwhelmed
the sky itself rushing down onto the earth. Carry it through: you will know what is fitting, if you consider the orb of the earth to be swimming.

[28,1] Nunc ad propositum reuertamur. Sunt qui existiment immodicis imbribus uexari terras posse, non obrui; magne, impetu magna ferienda sunt; faciet pluuia segetes malas, fructum grande, decutiet, intumescent riuis flumina, sed resident.

[28,1] Now let us return to the purpose. There are those who think that the lands can be vexed by immoderate rains, not overwhelmed; great one, great things must be struck with a great impetus; the rain will make the crops bad, the great fruit it will shake down, the rivers will swell with streams, but they subside.

[28,2] Quibusdam placet moueri mare et illinc causam tantae cladis accersere: non potest torrentium aut imbrium aut fluminum iniuria fieri tam grande naufragium. Ubi instat illa pernicies mutarique humanum genus placuit, fluere assiduos imbres et non esse modum pluuiis concesserim, suppressis aquilonibus et flatu sicciore austris nubes et amnes abundare. Sed adhuc in damna profectum est: "sternuntur segetes et deplorata colonis uota iacent longique perit labor irritus anni."

[28,2] To some it pleases that the sea be set in motion and from there to summon the cause of so great a calamity: by the injury of torrents or of rains or of rivers so great a shipwreck cannot be brought about. When that destruction is at hand and it has pleased that the human race be changed, I would grant that steady showers flow and that there be no measure to the rains, the north winds suppressed and the south winds with a breath drier than the south winds, that clouds and rivers abound. But thus far the advance has been into losses: “the crops are laid low, and the vows, lamented by the farmers, lie,
and the long year’s unavailing toil perishes.”

[28,3] Non laedi terrae debent sed abscondi. Itaque cum per ista prolusum est, crescunt maria, sed super solitum, et fluctum ultra extremum tempestatis maximae uestigium mittunt. Deinde a tergo uentis surgentibus ingens aequor euoluunt, quod longe a conspectu ueteris litoris frangitur.

[28,3] The lands ought not to be injured but to be hidden. And so, when by these things a prelude has been made, the seas increase, but beyond what is customary, and they send a wave beyond the farthest vestige of the greatest tempest. Then, with winds rising from the rear, they unroll a vast level of sea, which breaks far away from the sight of the old shore.

Deinde ubi litus bis terque prolatum est et pelagus in alieno constitit, uelut admoto malo comminus procurrit aestus ex imo recessu maris.

Then, when the shore had been extended twice and thrice and the open sea had taken its stand on alien ground, as if with the ram brought up, the surge runs forward at close quarters from the deepest recess of the sea.

[28,4] Nam ut aeris, ut aetheris, sic huius elementi larga materia est multoque in abdito plenior. Haec fatis mota, non aestu (nam aestus fati ministerium est), attollit uaste, sinu fretum agitque ante se. Deinde in miram altitudinem erigitur et illis tutis hominum receptaculis superest. Nec id aquis arduum est, quoniam aequo terris fastigio ascendunt.

[28,4] For as of air, as of ether, so of this
element the matter is abundant, and much
fuller in the hidden. This, moved by the fates, not by the tide (for the tide is the ministry of fate),
lifts up vastly, and with a curve drives the sea and pushes it before itself. Then
it is raised to a wondrous height and overtops those safe receptacles of men.
Nor is that arduous for the waters, since with a slope equal to the lands
they ascend.

[28,5] Si quis excelsa perlibret, maria paria sunt: nam par undique sibi ipsa tellus est (caua eius et plana inferiora sunt, sed istis adeo in rotundum orbis aequatus est); in parte autem eius et maria sunt, quae in unius aequalitatem pilae coeunt. Sed quemadmodum campos intuentem quae paulatim deuexa sunt fallunt, sic non intellegimus curuaturas maris et uidetur planum quicquid apparet. At illud aequale terris est ideoque, ut effluat, non magna mole se tollet, dum satis est illi, ut supra paria ueniat; leuiter exsurgere; nec a litore, ubi inferius est, sed a medio, ubi ille cumulus est, defluit.

[28,5] If someone were to level off the heights, the seas are equal: for the earth itself is equal to itself on every side (its hollows and flats are the lower parts, but with these the orb is so far evened into the round); and in a part of it are also the seas, which coalesce into the equality of a single sphere. But just as, for one beholding plains, the things that are gradually sloped downward deceive, so we do not perceive the curvatures of the sea, and whatever appears seems plane. Yet that is equal with the lands and therefore, in order that it may flow out, it will not lift itself with a great mass, since it is enough for it, so as to come above the level, to rise lightly; nor does it flow down from the shore, where it is lower, but from the middle, where that cumulus is, it flows down.

[28,6] Ergo ut solet aestus aequinoctilis sub ipsum lunae solisque coitum omnibus aliis maior undare, sic hic, qui ad occupandas terras emittitur, solitis maximisque uiolentior, plus aquarum trahit nec, antequam supra cacumina eorum, quos perfusurus est, montium creuit, deuoluitur. Per centena milia quibusdam locis aestus excurrit innoxius et ordinem seruat (ad mensuram enim crescit iterumque decrescit):

[28,6] Therefore, just as the equinoctial tide is accustomed to billow, greater than all the others, right at the very conjunction of the moon and sun, so this one, which is sent forth to seize the lands, more violent than the usual and even the greatest, draws more waters, and is not rolled back before it has risen above the peaks of the mountains which it is about to drench. For hundreds of miles in certain places the tide runs out harmless and keeps its order (for to a measure it grows and again decreases):

[28,7] at illo tempore solutus legibus sine modo fertur. Qua ratione?, inquis: eadem qua conflagratio futura est. Utrumque fit, cum deo uisum ordiri meliora, uetera finiri.

[28,7] but at that time, unbound by laws, it is borne without measure. By what reasoning?, you ask: the same by which the future conflagration will be. Both happen when it has seemed good to god to commence better things, the old to be finished.

Aqua et ignis terrenis dominantur; ex his ortus, ex his interitus est: ergo quandoque placuere res nouae mundo, sic in nos mare emittitur desuper, ut feruor ignisque, cum aliud genus exitii placuit.

Water and fire
hold dominion over things terrestrial; from these is origin, from these is destruction: therefore
whenever new conditions have pleased the world, thus upon us the sea is sent
from above, just as seething heat and fire, when another kind of destruction has pleased.

[29,1] Quidam existimant terram quoque concuti et dirupto solo noua fluminum capita detegere, quae amplius ut e pleno profundant. Berosos, qui Belum interpretatus est, ait ista cursu siderum fieri; adeo quidem affirmat, ut conflagrationi atque diluuio tempus assignet: arsura enim terrena contendit, quandoque omnia sidera, quae nunc diuersos agunt cursus, in Cancrum conuenerint, sic sub eodem posita uestigio, ut recta linea exire per orbes omnium possit; inundationem futuram, cum eadem siderum turba in Capricornum conuenerit. Illic solstitium, hic bruma conficitur: magnae potentiae signa, quando in ipsa mutatione anni momenta sunt.

[29,1] Certain men suppose that the earth also is concussed and, with the soil disrupted, reveals new heads of rivers, so that they may pour forth more abundantly, as from the full. Berossus, who interpreted Belus, says that these things come to be by the coursing of the stars; indeed he affirms it to such a degree that he assigns a time for the conflagration and for the deluge: for he contends that earthly things are going to burn, whenever all the stars, which now drive diverse courses, have converged into Cancer, so placed under the same footprint, that a straight line can go forth through the orbits of all; that an inundation will be in the future, when the same throng of stars has converged into Capricorn. There the solstice is completed, here the bruma (midwinter solstice) is completed: signs of great potency, since the moments are in the very mutation of the year.

[29,2] Et istas ego receperim causas (neque enim ex uno est tanta pernicies), et illam, quae in conflagratione nostris placet, hoc quoque transferendam puto: siue animal est mundus siue corpus natura gubernabile, ut arbores, ut sata, ab initio eius usque ad exitum quicquid facere quicquid pati debeat, inclusum est.

[29,2] And I for my part would accept these causes (for so great a destruction is not from a single source), and that one which, in the matter of the conflagration, pleases our people I think ought to be transferred here as well: whether the world is an animate being or a body governable by nature, as trees, as sown crops, from its inception to its exit whatever it ought to do, whatever it ought to suffer, is enclosed.

[29,3] Ut in semine omnis futuri hominis ratio comprehensa est et legem barbae canorumque nondum natus infans habet (totius enim corporis et sequentis auctus in paruo occultoque liniamenta sunt), sic origo mundi non minus solem et lunam et uices siderum et animalium ortus quam quibus mutarentur terrena continuit. In his fuit inundatio, quae non secus quam hiems, quam aestas, lege mundi uenit.

[29,3] As in the seed the rationale of the whole future man is comprehended, and the infant not yet born has the law of the beard and of gray hairs (for the lineaments of the whole body and of its subsequent augmentation are in the small and hidden), so the origin of the world contained no less the sun and the moon and the alternations of the stars and the births of animals than the things by which earthly realities would be altered. Among these was the inundation, which came by the law of the world no otherwise than winter, than summer.

[29,4] Itaque non pluuia istud fiet sed pluuia quoque, non incursu maris maris quoque incursu, non terrae motu sed terrae quoque motu: omnia adiuuabunt naturam, ut naturae constituta peragantur. Maximam tamen causam ad se inundandam terra ipsa praestabit, quam diximus esse mutabilem et solui in umorem.

[29,4] And so that will not come about by rain but by rain too, not by the inrush of the sea but by the inrush of the sea too, not by the movement of the earth but by the movement of the earth too: all things will aid nature, so that what has been established by nature may be accomplished. Nevertheless, the earth itself will furnish the greatest cause for its own being inundated, which we have said to be mutable and to be dissolved into moisture.

[29,5] Ergo quandoque erit terminus rebus humanis, cum partes eius interire debuerint abolerique funditus totae, ut de integro totae rudes innoxiaeque generentur nec supersit in deteriora praeceptor, plus umoris quam semper fuit fiet. Nunc enim elementa ad id quod debetur pensa surit: aliquid oportet alteri accedat, ut quae libramento stant, inaequalitas turbet. Accedet umori; nunc enim habet quo ambiat terras, non quo obruat: quicquid illi adieceris, necesse est in alienum locum exundet.

[29,5] Therefore at some time there will be a terminus to human affairs, when its parts shall have had to perish and the whole be abolished from the foundations, so that afresh the whole may be generated raw and innocuous, and no preceptor into worse things may remain; more moisture than ever has been will come to be. Now indeed the elements, weighed by measures to what is owed, press on: something must be added to one or the other, so that an inequality may disturb things which stand by the balance. It will be added to the moisture; for now it has that by which it encircles the lands, not that by which it overwhelms them: whatever you shall have added to it, it must overflow into a foreign place.

[29,6] Uide ergo ne terra debeat minui, ut ualidiori infirma succumbat. Incipiet ergo putrescere, dehinc laxata ire in umorem et assidua tabe defluere. Tunc exilient sub montibus flumina ipsosque impetu quatient; inde aura tacta manabunt;

[29,6] See therefore lest the earth ought to be diminished, so that the weaker may succumb to the stronger. Incipient therefore to putrefy, then, loosened, to go into moisture and to flow away with continual wasting. Then rivers will leap forth under the mountains and will shake them themselves with their impetus; thence, touched by the breeze, they will trickle;

[29,7] solum omne aquas reddet, summi scaturient montes. Quemadmodum in morbum transeunt sana et ulceri uicina consentiunt, ut quaeque proxima terris fluentibus fuerint, ipsa eluentur stillabuntque, deinde current et, hiante pluribus locis saxo, [per] fretum saliet et maria inter se componet. Nihil erunt Adria, nihil Siculi aequoris fauces, nihil Charybdis, nihil Scylla: omnes nouum mare fabulas obruet et hic qui terras cingit oceanus extrema sortitus ueniet in medium.

[29,7] all the soil will render waters, the highest mountains will gush forth. Just as healthy parts pass into disease and those neighboring an ulcer consent, so whatever things shall have been nearest to the lands becoming fluent, they themselves will be washed out and will drip, then will run; and, with the rock gaping in several places, [through] the strait it will leap and will bring the seas into accord with one another. They will be nothing— the Adriatic, the jaws of the Sicilian sea, Charybdis nothing, Scylla nothing: a new sea will overwhelm all the tales, and this ocean which girds the lands, allotted the outermost regions, will come into the middle.

[29,8] Quid ergo est? Nihilominus tenebit alienos menses hiems, aestas prohibebitur, et quodcumque terras sidus exsiccat, compresso ardore cessabit. Peribunt tot nomina, Caspium et Rubrum mare, Ambracii et Cretici sinus, Propontis et Pontus; peribit omne discrimen; confundetur quicquid in suas partes natura digessit.

[29,8] What then is it? Nevertheless winter will hold others’ months, summer will be prohibited,
and whatever star dries the lands, its ardor compressed, will cease. So many names will perish, the Caspian and the Red Sea, the Ambracian and
Cretan bays, the Propontis and the Pontus; every distinction will perish;
whatever nature has distributed into its own parts will be confounded.

Non muri quemquam, non turres tuebuntur. Non proderunt templa supplicibus nec urbium summa, quippe fugientes unda praeueniet et ex ipsis arcibus deferet.

No walls
will defend anyone, nor towers. The temples will not avail suppliants
nor the heights of cities; for the wave will overtake the fleeing
and will bear them down from the very citadels.

[29,9] Alia ab occasu, alia ab oriente concurrent. Unus humanum genus condet dies; quicquid tam longa fortunae indulgentia excoluit, quicquid supra ceteros extulit, nobilia pariter atque adornata magnarumque gentium regna pessundabit.

[29,9] Others will converge from the Occident, others from the Orient. One day will bury the human race; whatever so long an indulgence of Fortune has cultivated, whatever it has exalted above the rest, the noble and the adorned alike and the kingdoms of great nations it will utterly ruin.

[30,1] Sunt omnia, ut dixi, facilia naturae, utique <quae> a primo facere constituit, ad quae non subito sed ex denuntiato uenit. Iam autem a primo die mundi, cum in hunc habitum ex informi unitate discederet, quando mergerentur terrena decretum est; et ne sit quandoque uelut in nouo opere dura molitio, olim ad hoc maria se exercent.

[30,1] All things, as I said, are easy for Nature, especially those which she resolved from the first to do, to which she comes not suddenly but after fore‑announcement. Now already from the first day of the world, when it was departing from formless unity into this condition, it was decreed when the earthly things would be submerged; and, lest there should someday be, as in a new work, a hard exertion, long since for this the seas exercise themselves.

[30,2] Non uides ut fluctus in litora tamquam exiturus incurrat? Non uides ut aestus fines suos transeat et in possessionem terrarum mare inducat? Non uides ut illi perpetua cum claustris suis pugna sit?

[30,2] Do you not see how the wave runs upon the shores
as if about to break out? Do you not see how the tide transgresses its own bounds
and brings the sea into the possession of the lands? Do you not see how for it
there is a perpetual battle with its own barriers?

Quid porro? Istinc, unde tantum tumultum uides, metus est, e mari et magno spiritu erumpentibus fluuiis.

What moreover? From there, whence you see so great a tumult, there is fear, as rivers erupt from the sea with a great blast.

[30,3] Ubi non umorem natura disposuit, ut undique nos, cum uoluisset, aggredi posset? Mentior, nisi eruentibus terram umor occurrit et, quotiens nos aut auaritia defodit aut aliqua causa penetrare altius cogit, eruendi finis aliquando est. Adice quod immanes sunt in abdito lacus et multum maris conditi, multum fluminum per operta labentium.

[30,3] Where has nature not disposed moisture, so that she could assail us from every side whenever she wished? I lie, unless moisture meets those excavating the earth; and, whenever either greed buries us or some cause compels us to penetrate deeper, there is at some point a limit to excavation. Add that there are immense lakes in the hidden places, and much of the sea stored away, much of rivers gliding through covered channels.

[30,4] Undique ergo erit causa diluuio, cum aliae aquae subterfluant terras, aliae circumfluant, quae diu coercitae uincent et amnes amnibus iungent, paludibus stagna. Omnium tunc mare ora fontium im implebit et maiore hiatu soluet. Quemadmodum corpora nostra ad egestum uenter exhaurit, quemadmodum in sudorem eunt uires, ita tellus liquefiet et aliis causis quiescentibus intra se quo mergatur inueniet.

[30,4] On every side
therefore there will be cause for a deluge, since some waters flow beneath the lands,
others flow around them; long-coerced, they will prevail, and will join rivers to rivers,
pools to marshes. Then the sea will fill the mouths of all springs and
will unloose them with a greater hiatus. Just as our belly drains our bodies
for egestion, just as the forces pass into sweat,
so the earth will be liquefied, and, the other causes being at rest, within itself where
it may sink it will find.

Sed magis omma coitura crediderim.

But I would rather believe that all things are going to come together.

[30,5] Nec longa erit mora exitii: temptatur diuelliturque concordia. Cum semel aliquid ex hac idonea diligentia remiserit mundus, statim undique ex aperto et abdito, superne, ab infimo, aquarum fiet irruptio.

[30,5] Nor will the delay of destruction be long: concord is tested and torn asunder. When once the world has relaxed anything of this suitable diligence, at once on all sides, from the open and the hidden, from above, from the lowest, of waters there will be an irruption.

[30,6] Nihil est tam uiolentum, tam incontinens sui, tam contumax infestumque retinentibus quam magna uis undae: utetur libertate permissa et iubente natura, quae scindit circuitque complebit. Ut ignis diuersis locis ortus cito miscet incendium flammis coire properantibus, sic momento se redundantia pluribus locis maria committent.

[30,6] Nothing is so violent, so incontinent
of itself, so contumacious and hostile to those restraining it, as the great force
of the wave: it will use the liberty permitted and, with Nature bidding—who cleaves
and will fill what she goes around. As fire arisen in diverse places quickly mingles
a conflagration, the flames hastening to come together, so in a moment the
overflows in many places will join seas together.

[30,7] Nec ea semper licentia undis erit, sed peracto exitio generis humani extinctisque pariter feris, in quarum homines ingenia transierant, iterum aquas terra sorbebit, terra pelagus stare aut intra terminos suos furere coget, et reiectus e nostris sedibus in sua secreta pelletur oceanus et antiquus ordo reuocabitur.

[30,7] Nor will that license always belong to the waves, but, the destruction of the human race completed and the wild beasts likewise made extinct, into whose natures men had passed, again the earth will absorb the waters; the earth will compel the sea to stand or to rage within its termini, and the Ocean, cast out from our abodes, will be driven into its own recesses, and the ancient order will be recalled.

[30,8] Omne ex integro animal generabitur dabiturque terris homo inscius scelerum et melioribus auspiciis natus. Sed illis quoque innocentia non durabit, nisi dum noui sunt; cito nequitia subrepit. Uirtus difficilis inuentu est, rectorem ducemque desiderat: etiam sine magistro uitia discuntur.

[30,8] Every living creature will be generated anew,
and to the lands there will be given a man unknowing of crimes
and born under better auspices. But for them too innocence will not
endure, except while they are new; iniquity quickly creeps in. Virtue is difficult
to find; it desires a ruler and a leader: even without a master vices are learned.