Lucretius III 381-416

381-395: Small and light things may, at times (interdum) touch our bodies without our feeling their contact. This is because they can touch us in the spaces between the particles of anima. Examples given are: dust, chalk, spider webs, airborne plant seeds, bits of down, gnats and other small insects. Of course, it is possible for people, when sufficiently attentive, to feel the contact of these things. Lucr.'s point is that such things are small enough so that we sometimes do not sense their contact with us. The implication is that under usual circumstances one almost always notices contact with larger objects. Lucr. never tells us precisely how the particles of anima are distributed, but it does seem reasonable that the distances between them may have been, at some times and in some cases, about the width of the thread of a spider's web, the size of a single pappus (which, in some plants, is too small to be seen without a magnifying lens), or a small tuft of down (the probable meaning of pluma here). On the other hand, it has been quite reasonably argued that were any of these bodies more dense, and/or coming into contact with a human body at a high velocity, they could make much more of an impression. Accordingly, size alone does not seem to determine whether or not contact with a thing can move particles of anima. Even if Lucr. had argued that there were a theoretical limit to the denseness of matter in the universe, he still does not seem to account for the probable painful result of firing a lead ball the size of a poppy seed from a slingshot into a person's hand. 

381: inter dum = interdum. Sentimus is repeated three times in this sentence (lines 381, 384, and 388). The construction of the whole, with all of the objects in the three iterations of sentimus joined by nec (with the exception of the initial neque in 381) is fluid, but breaks logically into three segments, which are conjoined by nec at 383 and again at 398. The three segments describe: (1) dust and chalk, (2) cobwebs, down, and airborne plant seeds, and (3) gnats and other small insects. adhasum < adheasus, -us (m.) "adherence" (< ad + haereo).   

382: sidere (present active infinitive). < sido (3) "settle." The infinitive phrase incussam sidere cretam ("that shaken chalk falls") is thus parallel to adhaesum (381).   

383: aranei < araneus here "the spider."   

387: gravatim properly means "heavily," but here "slowly;" the poetic effect is that of an oxymoron.   

389: nec joins itum to vestigia.   

391: est...ciendum impersonal, with object multa "there must (prius) first be a stirring up of many things (perhaps corpora prima, or perhaps the primorida of the following line) before (quam)..." 

392: sentiscant follows the form of a present general condition, giving it here a potential sense, "can start to feel."   

391-395: At least three readings of this sentence are possible:   

  (1) Lucretius' meaning is that there must be a agitation of many things before the semina animai start to feel that the primordia (understand corporis) have been shaken (concussa). In this reading, primordia (esse) concussa is the complement (indirect discourse) of sentiscant, while inmixta (along with its complements) is an adjectival expansion of semina animai (e.g., Leonard and Smith), or  

 (2) primordia, as Munro suggests, is to be taken with the main clause (i.e., est ... ciendum). In this reading, Lucretius' meaning is that there must be an agitation of multa primorida (understand corporis) before the semina animai notice that (haec primordia) concussa (esse), or  

  (3) one could follow Munro's reading, but take concussa as a modifier of semina animai, while understanding sentiscant in an intransitive sense. Lucretius, the only author to use sentisco, employs this verb in one other passage (4.586), and there the meaning is intransitive. Furthermore, Lucretius is fond of the intransitive sense of sentire (e.g., 3.633; 4.228; 6.935), and this sense may fit here, for it calls attention to the fact that movement of the atoms of anima is not in itself sufficient to bring about awareness. Instead, the movements must be so controlled as to give rise to particular sensiferi motus, which seem again to be alluded to in lines 394 and 395.] 

394: possint is parallel to sentiscant, after the repeated quam.   

396-417: It is the animus and the mens that allow the particles of anima to create the conditions of life. This vital function is like that of the pupil of a human eye. 

399: (temporis) exiguam partem is an accusative extent of time.   

404: truncus is parallel to lacer, either the adjective iterating the idea that the man in question has been mutilated, or the noun, suggesting that he is "but a trunk." Ademptā animā is an ablative absolute. Circum (adv.) here has the sense of "nearby" or "on various sides" and does not suggest either "all around" or "entirely," as is made clear at line 406.   

410: dum modo introduces a clause of proviso, whose verbs are corrumpas, caedas, and relinquas.   

411: aciem (object of circum) here means "pupil," a natural extension of its meaning as "line of sight."   

412: id refers to the laceration of the pupil; eorum: the plural may refer to (a) the eyes in general, or (b) the pupil and the eye as a whole, or (c) the physical eye and the power of sight.   

416: vincti sunt: the subject is anima atque animus. The proximity of the verb phrase to the masculine member may have the masculine form of vincti.