BOOK II. VI. 41-44 



devised by nature to serve as a remedy for the 

 shadows of darkness — the moon. By the riddle of 

 her transformations she has racked the wits of 

 observers, who are ashamed that the star which is 

 nearest should be the one about which we knovv 

 least — always waxing or waning, and now curved 

 into the horns of a sickle, now just halved in 

 size, now rounded into a circle ; spotted and then 

 suddenly shining clear ; vast and full-orbed, and then 

 all of a sudden not there at all ; at one time shining 

 all night and at another rising late and for a part 

 of the day augmenting the Ught of the sun, ecHpsed Edipses 

 and nevertheless visible during the eclipse, invisible 

 at the cnd of the month when she is not believed to 

 be in trouble '^ ; again at one time low down and at 

 another up aloft, and not even this in a uniform wav, 

 but sometimes raised to the sky and sometimes 

 touching the mountain-tops, now borne np to the 

 North and now carried down to the South. The 

 first human being to observe all these facts about lier 

 was Endvmion — which accounts for the traditional 

 story of his love for her. We foi'sooth feel no grati- 

 tude towards those whose assiduous toil has given us 

 illumination on the subject of this luminary, while 

 owing to a curious disease of the human mind we 

 are pleased to enshrine in history records of bloodshed 

 and slaughter, so that persons ignorant of the facts 

 of the world may be acquaiuted with the crimes of 

 mankind. 



The moon then is nearest to the pole, and there- Themoon. 

 fore has the smallest orbit, completing the same 

 distance every 27^ daj^s that Saturn the highest star 

 covers, as we have said. in .30 years. Then she hngers 

 two days in conjunction with the sun, and after the 



195 



