Book 10
1.92
And the rising and setting of the sun, moon, and stars may be due to kindling and quenching,The opinion of Heraclitus (p. 32 B, 6 D) and Xenophanes, and Metrodorus of Chios. Servius, however (ad Verg. G. i. 249, Aen. iv. 584), attributes the theory to the Epicureans. provided that the circumstances are such as to produce this result in each of the two regions, east and west: for no fact testifies against this. Or the result might be produced by their coming forward above the earth and again by its intervention to hide them: for no fact testifies against this either. And their motionsCf. Lucr. v. 509 f. may be due to the rotation of the whole heaven, or the heaven may be at rest and they alone rotate according to some necessary impulse to rise, implanted at first when the world was made ...
1.93
and this through excessive heat, due to a certain extension of the fire which always encroaches upon that which is near it.From Lucr. v. 519 f. it is probable that words are lost from the text which ascribed these motions to the quest of fiery atoms by the heavenly bodies.
