BOOK II. V. 26-vi. 28 



that man was not born God's next of kin for the 

 purpose of approximating to the beasts in vileness. 

 But the chief consolations for nature's imperfection 

 in the case of man are that not even for God are all 

 things possible — for he cannot, even if he wishes, 

 commit suicide, the supreme boon that he has 

 bestowed on man among all the penalties of Ufe, 

 nor bestow eternity on mortals or recall the deceased, 

 nor cause a man that has Uved not to have hved or 

 one that has held high ofRce not to have held it — and 

 that he has no power over what is past save to forget 

 it, and (to hnk our fellowship with God by means of 

 frivolous arguments as well) that he cannot cause 

 twice ten not to be twenty " or do many things on 

 similar lines : which facts unquestionably demonstrate 

 the power of nature, and prove that it is this that we 

 mean by the word 'God.' It will not have been 

 irrelevant to have diverged to these topics, which 

 have aheady been widely disseminated because of 

 the unceasing enquir)'^ into the natm-e of God. 



VI. Let us return from these questions to the 

 remaining facts of nature. We have stated '^ that the 

 stars are attached to the flrmament, not assigned 

 to each of us in the way in which the vulgar beUeve, 

 and dealt out to mortals with a degree of radiance 

 proportionate to the lot of each, the brightest stars Astroiog^ 

 to the rich, the smaller ones to the poor, the dim ^^'^^^- 

 to those who are worn out; they do not each 

 rise with their own human being, nor indicate by 



• Cf. A. E. Housman Last Poems XXXV : 



— To think that two and two are four 

 And neither five nor three, 

 The heart of man has long been sore 

 And long 'tis like to be. 



* Above, §§ 7-9. 



187 



