Page:The Journal of Classical and Sacred Philology, Volume 1, 1854.djvu/44

 34 Journal of Philology. over again, that atoms move about in cunctas undique partes. True, but yet with reference to the omne, which has no limit, and therefore no bottom, Epicurus seems to have regarded mo- tion upwards as conservative, motion downwards as destructive. For that there is one upward, and one downward direction, he repeats again and again. The inherent necessity of their nature maintains a constant supply of atoms from above ; accident at any moment may, and at some moment must, interrupt the sup- ply from beneath, and then our heaven and earth, or any other of the numberless systems, must " pass away along the bottom- less void, so that in a moment of time not a rack will be left behind ; nothing, save untenanted space and viewless primal ele- ments" (i. 1108). I cannot understand why Lachmann objects to make the simile in i. 1060 refer to what precedes, and alters et simili to adsimili; nothing can give a better apparent illustra- tion of weights pressing upwards at our antipodes. Again, iv. 418 and 419, he seems to me to corrupt the passage by his transposition and other changes. I read: Nubila despicere et caelum ut videare videre et Corpora mirando sub terras abdita cselo. " And bodies withdrawn into the depths of that marvel- lous heaven below the earth :" a good picture of the reflection of the sky, &c. in the water. In iv. 462 also I should read mirando. As to the imperfect verses, I. 1068, &c., there can be no doubt of the meaning of the first four, whatever the actual words may have been; but 1072 3 ought, I think, to be supplied by these or similar words: consistere [earn magis ob rem] ; and then alia should not be altered, but a word like repelli be supplied at the end of the verse: "nor, even sup- posing there be a middle point, can anything rest at that point for that reason, rather than for some quite different reason be driven away from it." n. 911, Lachmann rightly reads respicit, but alios should not, I think, be changed, for the reference of alio is too obscure ; the meaning is, " every bodily sense works in relation to other senses, and no part of the body can by itself retain sensation." There is a passage, which occurs twice in Lucretius, m. 790 793, and v. 134 137, and which can hardly be right as it appears in any edition. In the corrupt words quod si posset enim, all editors, who make any change, alter quod and retain enim, but enim clearly introduces an absurdity. Lucretius says : " The nature of things forbids the soul to exist