35. Men worthy to be
remembered in the study of philosophy, who have been raised by your
praises to its highest place, declare, with commendable earnestness, as
their conclusion, that the whole mass of the world, by whose folds we
all are encompassed, covered, and upheld, is one animal4024
| 4024
Plato, Timæus, st. p. 30. |
possessed of
wisdom and reason; yet if this is a true, sure, and certain
opinion,
4025
| 4025 Lit.,
“of which things, however, if the opinion,” etc. |
they also will
forthwith cease to be gods whom you set up a little ago in its parts
without change of name.
4026
| 4026
i.e., deifying parts of the universe, and giving them, as deities, the
same names as before. |
For as one man cannot, while his
body remains entire, be divided into many men; nor can many men, while
they continue to be distinct and separate from each other,
4027
| 4027
Lit., “the difference of their disjunction being
preserved”—multi disjunctionis differentia
conservata, suggested in the margin of Ursinus for the
ms. multitudinis junctionis d.
c., retained in the first five edd. |
be fused into
one sentient individual: so, if the
world is a single
animal, and
moves from the impulse of one
mind, neither can it be
dispersed in
several deities; nor, if the gods are parts of it, can they be brought
together and changed into one living creature, with
unity of feeling
throughout all its parts. The
moon, the sun, the
earth, the
ether, the
stars, are members and parts of the
world; but if they are
parts and members, they are certainly not themselves
4028
| 4028
Lit., “of their own name.” |
living creatures; for in no thing can
parts be the very thing which the whole is, or think and feel for
themselves, for this cannot be effected by their own actions, without
the whole creature’s joining in; and this being established and
settled, the whole matter comes back to this, that neither Sol, nor
Luna, nor Æther, Tellus, and the
rest, are gods. For they
are parts of the
world, not the proper names of deities; and thus it is
brought about that, by your disturbing and confusing all divine things,
the world is set up as the sole god in the universe, while all the rest
are cast aside, and that as having been set up vainly, uselessly, and
without any reality.
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