Lucretius: De Rerum Natura 3

242 Pages·1997·12.426 MB·Latin, English

by  P. Michael Brown

L U C R E T I U S
De Rerum "Natura III
with an Introduction, Text, Translation & Commentary
by
IP, M ichael Birowim

LUCRETIUS
De Rerum Natura III
With ai; roduction, Text, Translation and Commentary by
P. MICHAEL BROWN
Aris & Phillips Ltd - Warminster - England
© P. Michael Brown 1997. All rights reserved. No part of this
publication may be reproduced or stored in a retrieval system or
transmitted in any form or by any means including photocopying
without the prior permission of the publishers in writing.
ISBNS 0 85668 694 8 cloth
0 85668 695 6 limp
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
Printed and published in England by Aris & Phillips Ltd,
Teddington House, Warminster, Wiltshire BA12 8PQ
Contents
INTRODUCTION 1
DE RERVM NATVRA III. 19
COMMENTARY 91
Select Bibliography 223
Index 226

Preface
This edition is designed to make the third book of Lucretius' poem, with its universal
message, easily accessible: in it, I have attempted to provide all the help required by
the comparative novice in Latin, while at the same time including material which I
hope may be of use to the more advanced student and of interest to the Lucretian
scholar and specialist. My first aim has been to elucidate the philosophical argument
throughout: I hope to have thrown new light on two areas in particular, firstly the
poet's use of terminology for the soul and its two parts, which has sometimes
confused editors, and secondly the twin aims of his conclusion, where he seeks not
only to prove that death is the end of consciousness but also to reconcile the reader to
the prospect. My second aim has been to do what justice I could to the poetry (for
the full appreciation of which a proper understanding of the philosophical argument
is naturally a prerequisite), by analysing some of the book's literary and artistic
features. The text (which includes no emendations of my own) is designed to
provide as complete and continuously readable a version as possible without resort to
extravagant conjecture; the prose translation is as literal as the aim to produce a
reasonably idiomatic version allowed. As usual in this series, the notes are keyed to
the translation, not to the Latin text.
My debt to the work of previous scholars, in particular of Lambinus, Munro,
Bailey, Kenney and M.F.Smith, is immense and will be immediately apparent; many
of the parallel passages which I cite are taken over from them, with only occasional
acknowledgment, nor have I usually recorded where I have followed or differed from
them on a given point.
I am grateful to Adrian Phillips and his colleagues for this opportunity to make
a second contribution to their classical series and for all their assistance throughout.
Once more, I am especially indebted to Professor Malcolm Willcock, who read
drafts firstly of half the work and later of the whole, and whose scrupulous attention
and perceptive comments have again proved invaluable and rescued me from many
errors; for the defects that remain, I am again solely responsible. Sections I, II, III,
and V of the introduction are based partly on the introduction to my edition of book I
for the Bristol Classical Press, and I am grateful to John Betts for his agreement over
this. My thanks are also due to Professors M.F.Smith and D.A.West, for
encouragement and profitable discussion over many years. It is an especial pleasure
to acknowledge my debt to my daughter, Lindsay MacLeod, for designing the cover
illustration: I must also thank all those who have patiently helped to initiate me, as a
complete novice, into the mysteries of the word-processor in order to produce this
edition.
Department of Classics August 1997
University of Glasgow

1
Introduction
I. THE POEM
Few poems have such a clear-cut purpose, and leave so little doubt as to their
'meaning', as that of Lucretius. The six books provide, in outline, an account of
Epicurean physics, seeking thereby to explain the nature of the universe and of
everything in it in scientific terms. But this science is not expounded academically,
for its own sake, but in order to serve two practical goals, also inherited from
Epicurus: as the poet constantly reminds us, he has a twofold object, the removal of
the two great religious fears which he thinks plague mankind, the fear that the gods
control, or intervene in, the workings of the universe, and the fear of death. As with
Epicurus, the first fear is eliminated by the demonstration that the universe and all its
processes are governed, not by capricious deities, but by scientific law: the fear of
death is eradicated by the demonstration that the soul, the organ of consciousness, is
material and dissolved at death, making any form of conscious after-life impossible;
in the conclusion to III Lucretius seeks not only to draw this inference but also to
reconcile the reader to the prospect of death as the end of consciousness (sec
introductory notes to 830-1094 and 931-77).
The six books fall naturally into three pairs. The first pair establishes the basics
of the physical system: I presents the arguments for the existence of the two ultimate
constituents of the universe, atoms and void, attacks rival views of the ultimate
nature of reality, and concludes with arguments for the infinity of atoms and of void,
and of the universe which they comprise. II deals principally with varieties of
atomic motion and of atomic shape, and with the differences which these produce in
visible atomic compounds, and ends with the argument that the universe contains an
infinite number of finite worlds roughly similar to our own.
I and II prepare first for III and IV, which together cover Lucretian psychology,
his account of the soul or psyche: in III the exposition of its physical constitution
leads on first to the long sequence of arguments for its mortality, which follows
inevitably from its atomic nature, and then to the triumphant conclusion aimed not
only at fear of any form of after-life but also at fear of ceasing to exist. IV is
complementary to III, in its attempt to explain in outline how all forms of perception,
emotion and consciousness can be explained on the hypothesis of an atomic,
material, destructible soul, thus helping to corroborate the thesis of III that the soul is
material and therefore destructible.
I and II are preparatory secondly for V and VI, which together deal with various
aspects of our, finite, world and by implication of the infinite number of other,
roughly similar, worlds in the universe: V deals first with its ultimate destructibility
and conversely with its origin, of which a reconstruction is provided, then with its
2 INTRODUCTION I
astronomy (a feature of a given world, not of the universe at large, since each world
had its own set of heavenly bodies), and finally with the origin and development of
all types of life on earth, culminating in a rather a priori account of the development
of human civilisation. VI goes on to cover a miscellany of the world's more
specialised natural phenomena, including thunder, whirlwinds, earthquakes,
volcanoes and plague.
This analysis reveals how closely the whole poem is geared to the elimination of
the two great religious fears. V and VI, prepared for by I and II, are designed to
banish the fear of divine control or intervention in the workings of nature, by setting
out an explanation of all phenomena in terms of scientific law. Ill and IV, for which
I and II have also provided the ground-work, are primarily aimed, as already
described, at the eradication of the fear of death, by showing that the soul is material
and therefore destructible: at the same time, they have a secondary relevance to the
removal of the first fear, in their attempt to show that all aspects of psychology can
be explained in natural rather than in divine terms.
The poem follows a tradition of personal appeal in the Epicurean school, taking
the form of an attempt to convert Memmius, a Roman politician (see Introduction II
below), to the philosophy; similarly, Epicurus' works had sometimes taken the form
of letters addressed to specific disciples. Though Memmius is not named in III, IV
and VI, the second-person addresses in these books sometimes, as at III 417-24,
echo the language associated with him in I, II and V, and it is only through
Memmius that the general reader is addressed throughout the poem.
Like Virgil's Aeneid, the work never underwent final revision by its author.
Though the poet has clearly carried out the bulk of his design (at VI 92-3 the sixth
book is announced as the last), the promise to give an extended account of the
refined atomic structure of the gods, or of their abodes, or of both (V 155) is
nowhere fulfilled, and in the eyes of many readers the poem cannot have been
intended to end, as it does, with a grim detail in the account of the Great Plague of
Athens. While the repetition of a number of shorter passages within the poem is
clearly intentional, the use of I 926-50, from the famous account of the poet's
mission, to open Book IV has the appearance of a temporary expedient which would
not have survived revision. Though the text is generally better organised than to
justify the wholesale transposition of arguments once popular with Lucretian editors
(see, e.g., introductory note to 417-829), there are occasional difficulties of
transition and, in addition to passages which might have been clarified in revision, a
number of loose ends, sometimes apparently arising from the inclusion of alternative
versions of an argument or passage (e.g. Ill 615-23 and 784-99, IV 26^14 and 45-
53, IV 722-76 and 777-817) or the addition of afterthoughts unadjusted to their
context (e.g. Ill 806-18 and 1076-94).