Chap. 3.] ACCOUNT OF THE WORLD. 17 



credible swiftness ^ I am not able to say, whether the sound 

 caused by the whirling about of so great a mass be excessive, 

 and, therefore, far beyond what our ears can perceive, nor, 

 indeed, whether the resounding of so many stars, all carried 

 along at the same time and revolving in their orbits, may 

 not produce a kind of delightful harmony of incredible sweet- 

 ness^. To us, who are in the interior, the world appears to 

 glide silently along, both by day and by night. 



Various circumstances in nature prove to us, that there 

 are impressed on the heavens innumerable figures of animals 

 and of all kinds of objects, and that its surface is not per- 

 fectly polished like the eggs of birds, as some celebrated 

 authors assert^. For we find that the seeds of all bodies fall 

 down from it, principally into the ocean, and, being mixed 

 together, that a variety of monstrous forms are in this way 

 frequently produced. And, indeed, this is evident to the eye ; 

 for, in one part, we have the figure of a wain, in another of 

 a bear, of a bull, and of a letter* ; while, in the middle of them, 

 over our heads, there is a white circle*. 



(4.) AVith respect to the name, I am influenced by the 

 unanimous opinions of all nations. For what the Greeks, 

 from its being ornamented, have termed Koa^os, we, from its 

 perfect and complete elegance, have termed mundus. The 

 name ccelum^ no doubt, refers to its being engraven, as it 



* See Ptolemy, uhi supra. 



* This opinion, which was maintained by Pythagoras, is noticed and 

 derided by Aristotle, De Ccelo, Ub. ii. cap. 9. p. 462-3. A brief account 

 of Pythagoras's doctrine on this subject is contained in Enfield's Philo- 

 sophy, i. 386. 



3 Pliny probably here refers to the opinion which Cicero puts into the 

 mouth of one of the interiocutors in his treatise De Nat. Deor. ii. 47, 

 " Quid enim pulclirius ea figura, quse sola omnes alias figuras complexa 

 continet, qua^que nihil asperitatis habere, nihil offensionis potest, nihil 

 incisum anguhs, nihil anfiractibus, nihil eminens, nihil lacunosum ? " 



* The letter A, in the constellation of the triangle ; it is named AeXrwrov 

 by Aratus, 1. 235 ; also by Manihus, i. 360. We may remark, that, 

 except in tliis one case, the constellations have no visible resemblance to 

 the objects of which they bear the name. 



^ "Locmn himc Plimi de Galaxia, sive Lactea via, interpretantur onmes 

 docti." Alexandre, in Lemaire, i. 227. It may be remarked, that the 

 word vertex is here used in the sense of the astronomical term zenith, 

 not to signify the pole. 



VOL. I. 



