BOOK II. Lxiii. 156-158 



we should be tortured by the perverted punish- 

 ment of the noose which imprisons the breath whose 

 departure it is seeking ; lest if we sought death 

 in the deep our burial should serve for fodder " ; 

 lest the torture of the steel should cleave our body. 

 So is it ! in mercy did she generate the potion whereof Mm's abn.< 

 the easiest draught — as men drink when thirsty — ofhergifis. 

 might painlessly just blot us out, without injury to the 

 body or loss of blood, in such wise that when dead 

 no birds nor beasts should touch us, and one that had 

 perished for himself should be preserved for the earth. 

 Let us own the truth : what earth has produced as a 

 cure for our ills, we have made into a deadly poison ; 

 why, do we not also put her indispensable gift 

 of iron to a similar use ? Nor yet should we have 

 any right to complain even if she had engendered 

 poison to serve the purpose of crime. In fact in 

 regard to one of nature's elements we have no grati- 

 tude. For what luxuries and for what outrageous 

 uses does she not subserve mankind ? She is flung 

 into the sea, or dug away to allow us to let in the 

 channels. Water, iron, wood, fire, stone, growing 

 crops, are employed to torture her at all hours, and 

 much more to make her minister to our luxuries 

 than our sustenance. Yet in order to make the 

 sufTerings inflicted on her surface and mere outer 

 skin seem endurable, we probe her entrails, digging 

 into her veins of gold and silver and mines of copper 

 and lead ; we actually drive shafts down into the 

 depth to search for gems and certain tiny stones ; we 

 drag out her entrails, we seek a jewel merely to be 

 worn upon a finger ! How many hands are worn 

 away with toil that a single knuckle may shine 

 resplendent! If any beings of the nether world 



293 



