BOOK I CH. Xvi § 46. 141

is an explanation of the belief of the vulgar, the absurdities of which are shortly after pointed out: how far Lucretius himself allowed eviden- tial weight to these visions is not clear. In Iv 26 foll. he gives as his reason for discussing the nature of the images (simulacra) the fact that they take the shape of the dead and cause terror by presenting themselves to us both awake and asleep, ne forte animas Acherunte reamur | effugere aut umbras inter vivos volitare | , and in 722 foll. he shows how such simulacra may arise spontaneously in the air. It seems therefore that these images can only be trusted in so far as they are supported by abstract reasoning. Compare also Sext. Emp. Math, 1x 25 (quoted by Munro) ’Emikoupos dé &ék TOY KaTa TOYS Unvous havTagiay olerat TOs avOparous Evvotay €omrakévat beod" peydrov yap «idea, pyoi, cal dvOpwmopoppev Kata Tovs Umvous mpoomurror- Tav vTédaBov Kat Tais GAnOeias Urdpyew Tivas ToLoiTovs Beodis avOpwmopdp- gouvs. The Stoic Balbus is in agreement with Epic. on this point; and Aristotle (quoted by Sextus 1. c.) made these appearances one of the two causes to which he traces the origin of religion, dé dvoiv dpydv évvoav Oedv edeye yeyovevat, ard Te TOV Tepl THY WuxnY ouvBaLvorvT@Y Kal amd TOY peETED- pov, the former owing to rods év Trois Umrvois yryvopevous ravtns évOovotacpovs kal Tas pavtelas’ Otay yap, pyoiv, €v To bmvorv Ka Eavtiy yévnrat } Wyn, tore thy idiay drodaBotca vow it exercises a prophetic power, just as Homer tells us it does at the moment of death ; é« rovrwv ob tmevénoar of dvOpwrot eival te Oedv TO Kab EavTov eotkds TH uy Kal TavTwY émioTnpoVLKe- rarov, See H. Spencer Principles of Sociology ch. X and Tylor quoted below.
primas notiones: answering to natura above. We find the correspond- ing Greek term used of the mpoAnyers in Diog. L. X 38 avaykn yap To mparov evvonua Ka0 exactrov dboyyov BrérecOa kal pnOev drodei~ews mpoodeiaOat (if we are to have any standard of reference).
ne omnia—ad primas notiones. The zpodnWs which arises instinct- ively from the repeated appearances of Gods is contrasted with the ab- stract reasonings which follow. The Gods must be of human shape, for the most perfect nature must be also the most beautiful, and the human shape is more beautiful than any other; again, happiness cannot exist without virtue, nor virtue without reason, nor reason,except in human shape. The former argument is criticized § 77—86, the latter § 87—89.
§ 47. praestantissimam : ‘we are justified in believing that the most exalted of beings, whether we regard his happiness or his eternity, must be also (eandem) the most beautiful’, It would seem that both here and in § 45 we must explain the causal clauses vel guia and cum et aeterna by areference to praestans.
figura: the mathematical outline, a matter of fact ; species, outward appearance as distinguished from the inner nature ; forma (§ 48), the form artistically viewed as symbolizing the inner nature.
vos quidem—divinam : ‘ you Stoics at least are wont, in displaying the skill of the divine artificer’, see 11 87 and 134, and for fabr. § 19 n,
142 BOOK I CH. Xvut § 47.
modo hoc, modo illud: so (7'wse. V 33) when charged with contradicting what he had said in the De Finibus, C. replies tr diem vivimus; quodcumque nostros animos percussit, id dicimus, itaque soli sumus liberi, cf. Att. XIII 25 O Academiam volaticam ac sui similem, modo hue modo illuc, also Div. 1 62; and, of the Socratic irony, Lael. 13 qui non tum hoe tum wlud, ut in plerisque, sed idem semper. [Add Ac. 11 121, 134, Tuse. 1 40, Att. u 15, Parad. 14, Div. 1 120, 1 145. J.S. R.] For omission of verb, sce § 17 n.
§ 48. pulcherrima est: so Mady. /%n. 111 58 in place of the szt of Mss, on the ground that quae means quam pulcherrimam esse posui, humanam, not tali ut sit pulcherrima, cf. Sch. Opuse. U1 310.
ratio—hominis figura: cf. cai ef Aoyiopov ovK Eyopen ev GAA poppy Siya tis dvOperov, havepov ws Kal Tov Gedy avOpwTdpopHov xpr) katadeimew iva aby Aoyroua thy Urooracw exy Vol. Herc, vi pt. 2 p. 21 (conjecturally assigned to Metrodorus). Here as elsewhere the Epicurean refused to go beyond his own experience: ‘numguam vide (§ 87) thought apart from a human body’, or as it would now be worded, ‘apart from brain’,
hominis esse specie. The Gen. is sometimes substituted for the adjective with the Abl. of Quality; cf. 2. P. 1 26 § 48 (tyrannus) quamquam Jjigura est hominis tamen immanitate vineit beluas, Caes. DB. G. vi 27 (uri) specie sunt et colore tauri, and Liv. xxI 62 quoted below under nee soliditate. This arg. is criticized in § 89.
§ 49. quasi corpus: like the efSwAa of Homer and the ghosts of later times, cf. the interesting chapters on Animism in Tylor’s Primitive Culture esp. vol. 1 p. 449. The Epicurean Gods are of course material, but they are composed of the finest etherial atoms, similar to those which constitute the rational soul, and are therefore capable of acting immediately upon it: see the passages quoted in n. on drtermundia § 18, and the criticism by Cotta in §§ 71, 75, by Balbus in 1 59. Hirzel (p. 77 foll.) thinks that C. con- founded the images which reveal the Gods to us with the actual Gods ; and that the latter had more approach to substance than he allows them, as Philodemus (quoted by Zeller Stoics tr. p. 441) speaks of their taking food, and conversing together probably in Greek, cf. also Sch. Opuse. Iv 336— 359. The subject is discussed below. For the expression cf. Sen. Contr. II 12 § 11 quasi? dissertus es, quasi formonsus es, quasi dives es; unum tan- tum es non quasi, vappa (quoted in Roby § 1583), Pl. Stich. 552 foll., Plin. Lp. VIL 16 quasi testamenta, quasi civitas, and the legal fictions guast pos- sessio, quasi pignus &c.
Ch. xx. quivis=o ruyor, ‘every one’.
agnoscere : ‘to feel their force’, Sch. Opuse. 111 315 and 363.
qui viderit : causal relative.
sic tractet ut manu: so /?. 2.115 (of Panaetius) gud quae vix conjectura qualia sint possumus suspicari, sic adfirmat ut oculis ea cernere videatur aut tractare plane manu; Brut. 277 cum tndicta mortis se comperisse et manu