Book IL] 
ACCOUNT OF THE WORLD. 
13 
BOOK IL 
AN ACCOUNT OF THE WOELD AND THE ELEMENTS. 
[I have adopted the division of the chapters from Hardouin, as given 
in the editions of Yalpy, Lemaire, Ajasson, and Silh'g. ; the Roman figures, 
enclosed between brackets, are the numbers of the chapters in Dalechamps, 
De Laet, G-ronovius, Holland, and Poinsinet. The titles of the chapters 
are nearly the same with those in Yalpy, Lemaire, and Ajasson.] 
CHAP. 1. (1.) — ^WHETHER THE WOELD BE PIITITE, AND 
WHETHER THERE BE MORE THAK ONE WORLD. 
The world \ and whatever that be which we otherwise 
^ " Mundus." Tn translatiug from one language into another, it is 
proper, as a general priaciple, always to render the same word in the 
origiaal by the same word in the translation. But to this rule there are 
two exceptions ; where the languages do not possess words which pre- 
cisely correspond, and where the original author does not always use the 
same word in the same sense. Both these circumstances, I apprehend, 
apply to the case in question. The term Mrnidus is used by Pliny, 
sometimes to mean the earth and its immediate appendages, the visible 
solar system ; and at other times the umiverse ; while I think we may 
venture to assert, that in some instances it is used in rather a vague 
manner, without any distinct reference to either one or other of the above 
designations. T have, in almost all cases, translated it by the term worlds 
as approaching nearest to the sense of the original. The word mundus 
is frequently employed by Lucretius, especially in his fifth book, and 
seems to be almost always used in the more extended sense of universe. 
There are, indeed, a few passages where either meaning would be equally 
appropriate, and in one line it would appear to be equivalent to firma- 
ment or heavens ; " et mundi speciem violare serenam," iv. 138. Cicero, 
in his treatise De Natura Deorum, generally uses the term mundus in the 
sense of universe^ as in ii. 22, 37, 58 and 154 ; while in one passage, ii. 
132, it would appear to be employed in the more limited sense of the 
earth. It occasionally occurs in the Fasti of Ovid, but it is not easy to 
ascertain its precise import ; as in the line " Post chaos, ut primum data 
sunt tria corpora mundo," v. 41, where from the connexion it may be 
taken either in the more confined or in the more general sense. ManiHus 
employs the word very frequently, and his commentators remark, that he 
uses it in two distinct senses, the visible firmament fmd the universe ; and 
I am induced to think that he attaches stOl more meaning to the term. 
It occurs three times in the first eleven Hues of his poem. In the third 
line, " deducere mundo aggredior," mundus may be considered as equiva- 
