s, too, as she beholds in her mirror the wrinkles of old age, and
enquires of herself why it is that she was twice ravished. Thou, Time,
the consumer of {all} things, and thou, hateful Old Age, {together}
destroy all things; and, by degrees ye consume each thing, decayed by
the teeth of age, with a slow death.

"These things too, which we call elements, are not of unchanging
duration; pay attention, and I will teach you what changes they undergo.

"The everlasting universe contains four elementary bodies. Two of these,
{namely}, earth and water, are heavy, and are borne downwards by their
weight; and as many are devoid of weight, and air, and fire still purer
than air, nothing pressing them, seek the higher regions. Although these
are separated in space, yet all things are made from them, and are
resolved into them. Both the earth dissolving distils into flowing
water; the water, too, evaporating, departs in the breezes and the air;
its weight being removed again, the most subtle air shoots upwards into
the fires {of the aether} on high. Thence do they return back again, and
the same order is unravelled; for fire becoming gross, passes into dense
air; this {changes} into water, and earth is formed of the water made
dense. Nor does its own form remain to each; and nature, the renewer of
{all} things, re-forms one shape from another. And, believe me, in this
universe so vast, nothing perishes; but it varies and changes its
appearance; and to begin to be something different from what it was
before, is called being born; and to cease to be the same thing, {is to
be said} to die. Whereas, perhaps, those things are transferred hither,
and these things thither; yet, in the whole, all things {ever} exist.

"For my part, I cannot believe that anything lasts long under the same
form. 'Twas thus, ye ages, that ye came down to the iron from the gold;
'tis thus, that thou hast so often changed the lot of {various} places.
I have beheld that {as} sea, which once had been the most solid earth.
I have seen land made from the sea; and far away from the ocean the
sea-shells lay, and old anchors were found {there} on the tops of the
mountains. That which was a plain, a current of water has made into a
valley, and by a flood the mountain has been levelled into a plain; the
ground that was swampy is parched with dry sand; and places which have
endured drought, are wet with standing pools. Here nature has opened
fresh springs, but there she