On the Nature of the Universe (Oxford World’s Classics) (28 page)

He does not really accept what he professes,

He does not wholly remove himself from life,

But all unknown to himself he makes something

Of himself to survive and go on living.

For when in life he tells himself his future

That after death his body by wild beasts

880

And birds will be devoured, torn to pieces,

He’s pitying himself. For he doesn’t separate

Himself from the body lying there, he thinks

It is still himself, and standing by it gives

Some part of his own feeling to it.

Hence he resents that he was born mortal,

He does not see that in real death there’ll be

885

No other self that living could bewail

His perished self, or stand by to feel pain

In body torn or burnt. For if in death

It is painful to be mangled by wild beasts,

I do not see how it is not also painful

Laid on a pyre to shrivel in hot flames

890

Or to be packed in honey and stifled, or

To lie stiff with cold upon a marble slab,

Or to be crushed under a weight of earth.

893

Men lie at table, goblets in their hands

912

And garlands on their brows; and in their hearts

They say ‘Short is the joy of men,

Too soon it is gone and none can e’er recall it.’

915

As if in death their chief trouble will be

A parching thirst or burning drought, or a desire

For something that they crave and cannot get.

918

‘No longer now a happy home will greet you

894

Nor loving wife, nor your sweet children run

To snatch your kisses and to touch your heart

With silent sweet content. Nor shall you prosper

In your life’s work, a bulwark to your people.

Unhappy wretch,’ they cry, ‘one fatal day

Has taken all those sweets of life away.’

But this they do not add, that the desire

900

Of things like these hangs over you no more.

Which if their minds could truly see and words

Follow, why, then from great distress and fear

They’ld free themselves. ‘You in the sleep of death

Lie now and will forever lie, removed

905

Far from all pain and grief. But we, who saw

You turned to ashes on a dreadful pyre,

Mourned you in tears insatiable. For ever

No day will lift that sorrow from our hearts.’

Then we must ask, what bitterness is this,

If all things end in sleep and quiet, that

910

A man can waste away in ceaseless grief.

911

For no one feels the want of himself and his life

919

When mind and body alike are quiet in sleep.

920

For all we care, that sleep might have no end.

Free from all yearning for ourselves we lie.

And yet, when a man springs up, startled from sleep

And pulls himself together, through our limbs

Those first beginnings are never far away

From the sense-giving motions of the body.

925

Therefore much less to us must death be thought

To be, if anything can be less than what

We see to be nothing. For matter is thrown apart

More widely after death, and no one wakes

When once death’s chilling pause has halted him.

930

Again, suppose that nature suddenly

Finding a voice upbraided one of us

In words like these: ‘What ails you, mortal man,

And makes you wallow in unhealthy grief?

Why do you moan and groan and weep at death?

For if your former life now past has pleased you

935

And if your blessings through a broken jar

Have not run out, all wasted, unenjoyed,

Why don’t you, like a man that’s wined and dined

Full well on life, bow out, content, and so

Your exit make and rest in peace, you fool?

But if the things you’ve liked and loved are spent

940

And life’s a grievance to you, why then seek

To add more? They will go just like the others,

No joy at all, and all will end in dust.

Better to make an end of life and trouble.

For there is nothing else I can devise

To please you. Always everything’s the same.

945

And if your body not yet by the years

Is worn and fails, yet everything remains

The same. There is no change, even if you live

Longer than anyone on earth, and even more

If it should be your fate never to die.’

What answer can we give to this, except

950

That nature’s charge is just and that this speech

Makes a good case, from which we’re not acquitted?

Consider now an old man who complains

Excessively about his death to come.

Nature would justly cry out louder still

And say in bitter words, ‘Away, you rogue,

With all these tears and stop this snivelling.

All life’s rewards you have reaped and now you’re withered,

955

But since you always want what you have not got

And never are content with that you have,

Your life has been unfulfilled, ungratifying,

And death stands by you unexpectedly

Before the feast is finished and you are full.

960

Come now, remember you’re no longer young

And be content to go; thus it must be.’

She would be right, I think, to act like this,

Right to rebuke him and find fault with him.

For the old order always by the new

Thrust out gives way; and one thing must from another

965

Be made afresh; and no one ever falls

Into the deep pit and black Tartarus.

Matter is needed for the seeds to grow

Of future generations. Yes, but all

When life is done will follow you, and all

Before your time have fallen, and will fall.

So one thing from another will always come.

970

And life none have in freehold, all as tenants.

Look back upon the ages of time past

Eternal, before we were born, and see

That they have been nothing to us, nothing at all.

This is the mirror nature holds for us

To show the face of time to come, when we

At last are dead. Is there in this for us

975

Anything horrible? Is there anything sad?

Is it not more free from care than any sleep?

And all those things, for sure, which fables tell

Exist deep down in Acheron, exist

For us in this our life. No Tantalus

980

Unhappy wretch fears the great rock that hangs

In the air above him, frozen with vain terror.

No. It is in this life that the fear of gods

Oppresses mortals without cause: the fall

They fear is that which chance may bring to them.

No Tityos lying in Acheron is torn

By vultures, nor through all eternity

Dig though they may can they find anything

985

In that vast breast; and though his frame be spread

Immense to cover not nine acres only

But the whole globe of earth with limbs outstretched,

Yet not forever will he suffer pain

990

Nor from his body furnish food always.

Our Tityos is here, lying in love,

And torn by winged cares (anxiety

Consumes him) or tortured by some other craving.

Sisyphus also in this life appears

995

Before our eyes. He seeks the people’s votes

Athirst to get the Lictor’s rods and axes,

And always loses and retires defeated.

For to seek power that’s empty and never got

And always vainly toil and sweat for it

This is to strain to push up the steep hill

The rock that always from the very top

1000

Rolls headlong down again to the plain below.

Another simile! The Danaids.

To be always feeding an ungrateful mind

And fill it with good things, and yet never

To satisfy it (as the seasons do

1005

When they come round bringing their fruits and all

Their manifold delights, and yet we are never

Filled full with all the varied fruits of life),

This I believe is what the story means

Of young and lovely girls that must pour water

Into a leaking urn, and all their pains