Ocellus Lucanus: On the Nature of the Universe

From his letter to Casaubon.

William Sohier, a noble Franco-Belgian whose virtues lie hidden through the injustice of fortune, was the first to invite me to this arduous work, having shared with me a copy of the Venetian edition. It seemed that some utility would likewise accrue to the Peripatetic discipline from this, since many dogmas occur in Aristotle that were transferred into the Peripatos with a most abundant yield—which same thing it will appear in the following commentaries that Plato often performed. This will indeed be no slight proof of Italian glory, seeing that the Italian philosophers, the princes of wisdom, pursued these dogmas with such veneration that they considered it glorious for themselves and most wisely useful for posterity to transfer them into their own books. Therefore, with a ready mind, I decided to undertake this noble charge, in which even the attempt itself, though it might be destitute of a happy success, seemed praiseworthy; and thus, moved by the reasons I have related, and perhaps further urged by the fate of Ocellus—who, when he recounts the dissensions of the principal parts of the world, always demands his own protections from a craftsman entangled in disputes—since we know that Commelinus himself published him in noble types, when he was almost perishing for lack of copies, at that time when he was being pressed by the sharp disagreements of lawsuits.

What kind of version of Ocellus.

I wished to translate this distinguished little work of Ocellus on the nature of the universe into the Latin language by an exact version, occupied almost in rendering word for word, so that it might be permitted for anyone ignorant of the Greek idiom to draw out the secret meanings of the author by his own effort; and so that a slightly more pleasant diction might recall those whom that too-harsh method of exposition was repelling, I added a paraphrase. Furthermore, I decided to add a commentary sprinkled with various learning, so that the reader's mind, exhausted by philosophical gravity, might be refreshed from time to time. Before I execute these individual tasks with faithful labor, it was useful to preface a few things with you, my reader.