verse is a concrete mass of rough and smooth, and hooked and
crooked bodies, with the addition of a vacuum: this he calls a dream of
Democritus, and says that he is here not teaching, but wishing;--but he
himself, examining each separate part of the world, teaches that whatever
exists, and whatever is done, is caused, or has been caused, by natural
weights and motions. In this way he releases God from a great deal of hard
work, and me from fear; for who is there who, (when he thinks that he is
an object of divine care,) does not feel an awe of the divine power day
and night? And who, whenever any misfortunes happen to him (and what man
is there to whom none happen?) feels a dread lest they may have befallen
him deservedly--not, indeed, that I agree with that; but neither do I with
you: at one time I think one doctrine more probable, and at other times I
incline to the other.

XXXIX. All these mysteries, O Lucullus, lie concealed and enveloped in
darkness so thick that no human ingenuity has a sight sufficiently
piercing to penetrate into heaven, and dive into the earth. We do not
understand our own bodies: we do not know what is the situation of their
different parts, or what power each part has: therefore, the physicians
themselves, whose business it was to understand these things, have opened
bodies in order to lay those parts open to view. And yet empirics say that
they are not the better known for that; because it is possible that, by
being laid open and uncovered, they may be changed. But is it possible for
us, in the same manner, to anatomize, and open, and dissect the natures of
things, so as to see whether the earth is firmly fixed on its foundations
and sticks firm on its roots, if I may so say, or whether it hangs in the
middle of a vacuum? Xenophanes says that the moon is inhabited, and that
it is a country of many cities and mountains. These assertions seem
strange, but the man who has made them could not take his oath that such
is the case; nor could I take mine that it is not the case. You also say
that, opposite to us, on the contrary side of the earth, there are people
who stand with their feet opposite to our feet, and you call them
Antipodes. Why are you more angry with me, who do not despise these
theories, than with those who, when they hear them, think that you are
beside yourselves?

Hiretas of Syracuse, as Theophrastus tells us, thinks that the sun, and
moon, and stars, and all the heavenly bodies