On the Nature of Things Part 5

The rest; yet since these things are mortal all-- The pliant mortal, with a body soft; The brittle mortal, with a crumbling frame; The hollow with a porous-all must be Disjoined from the primal elements, If still we wish under the world to lay Immortal ground-works, whereupon may rest The sum of weal and safety, lest for thee All things return to nothing utterly.

Now, too: whate'er we see possessing sense Must yet confessedly be stablished all From elements insensate. And those signs, So clear to all and witnessed out of hand, Do not refute this dictum nor oppose; But rather themselves do lead us by the hand, Compelling belief that living things are born Of elements insensate, as I say.

Sooth, we may see from out the stinking dung Live worms spring up, when, after soaking rains, The drenched earth rots; and all things change the same: Lo, change the rivers, the fronds, the gladsome pastures Into the cattle, the cattle their nature change Into our bodies, and from our body, oft Grow strong the powers and bodies of wild beasts And mighty-winged birds. Thus nature changes All foods to living frames, and procreates From them the senses of live creatures all, In manner about as she uncoils in flames Dry logs of wood and turns them all to fire.

And seest not, therefore, how it matters much After what order are set the primal germs, And with what other germs they all are mixed, And what the motions that they give and get?

But now, what is't that strikes thy sceptic mind, Constraining thee to sundry arguments Against belief that from insensate germs The sensible is gendered?--Verily, 'Tis this: that liquids, earth, and wood, though mixed, Are yet unable to gender vital sense.

And, therefore, 'twill be well in these affairs This to remember: that I have not said Senses are born, under conditions all, From all things absolutely which create Objects that feel; but much it matters here Firstly, how small the seeds which thus compose The feeling thing, then, with what shapes endowed, And lastly what they in positions be, In motions, in arrangements. Of which facts Naught we perceive in logs of wood and clods; And yet even these, when sodden by the rains, Give birth to wormy grubs, because the bodies Of matter, from their old arrangements stirred By the new factor, then combine anew In such a way as genders living things.

Next, they who deem that feeling objects can From feeling objects be create, and these, In turn, from others that are wont to feel

When soft they make them; for all sense is linked With flesh, and thews, and veins--and such, we see, Are fas.h.i.+oned soft and of a mortal frame.

Yet be't that these can last forever on: They'll have the sense that's proper to a part, Or else be judged to have a sense the same As that within live creatures as a whole.

But of themselves those parts can never feel, For all the sense in every member back To something else refers--a severed hand, Or any other member of our frame, Itself alone cannot support sensation.

It thus remains they must resemble, then, Live creatures as a whole, to have the power Of feeling sensation concordant in each part With the vital sense; and so they're bound to feel The things we feel exactly as do we.

If such the case, how, then, can they be named The primal germs of things, and how avoid The highways of destruction?--since they be Mere living things and living things be all One and the same with mortal. Grant they could, Yet by their meetings and their unions all, Naught would result, indeed, besides a throng And hurly-burly all of living things-- Precisely as men, and cattle, and wild beasts, By mere conglomeration each with each Can still beget not anything of new.

But if by chance they lose, inside a body, Their own sense and another sense take on, What, then, avails it to a.s.sign them that Which is withdrawn thereafter? And besides, To touch on proof that we p.r.o.nounced before, Just as we see the eggs of feathered fowls To change to living chicks, and swarming worms To bubble forth when from the soaking rains The earth is sodden, sure, sensations all Can out of non-sensations be begot.

But if one say that sense can so far rise From non-sense by mutation, or because Brought forth as by a certain sort of birth, 'Twill serve to render plain to him and prove There is no birth, unless there be before Some formed union of the elements, Nor any change, unless they be unite.

In first place, senses can't in body be Before its living nature's been begot,-- Since all its stuff, in faith, is held dispersed About through rivers, air, and earth, and all That is from earth created, nor has met In combination, and, in proper mode, Conjoined into those vital motions which Kindle the all-perceiving senses--they That keep and guard each living thing soever.

Again, a blow beyond its nature's strength Shatters forthwith each living thing soe'er, And on it goes confounding all the sense Of body and mind. For of the primal germs Are loosed their old arrangements, and, throughout, The vital motions blocked,--until the stuff, Shaken profoundly through the frame entire, Undoes the vital knots of soul from body And throws that soul, to outward wide-dispersed, Through all the pores. For what may we surmise A blow inflicted can achieve besides Shaking asunder and loosening all apart?

It happens also, when less sharp the blow, The vital motions which are left are wont Oft to win out--win out, and stop and still The uncouth tumults gendered by the blow, And call each part to its own courses back, And shake away the motion of death which now Begins its own dominion in the body, And kindle anew the senses almost gone.

For by what other means could they the more Collect their powers of thought and turn again From very doorways of destruction Back unto life, rather than pa.s.s whereto They be already well-nigh sped and so Pa.s.s quite away?

Again, since pain is there Where bodies of matter, by some force stirred up, Through vitals and through joints, within their seats Quiver and quake inside, but soft delight, When they remove unto their place again: 'Tis thine to know the primal germs can be a.s.saulted by no pain, nor from themselves Take no delight; because indeed they are Not made of any bodies of first things, Under whose strange new motions they might ache Or pluck the fruit of any dear new sweet.

And so they must be furnished with no sense.

Once more, if thus, that every living thing May have sensation, needful 'tis to a.s.sign Sense also to its elements, what then Of those fixed elements from which mankind Hath been, by their peculiar virtue, formed?

Of verity, they'll laugh aloud, like men, Shaken asunder by a spasm of mirth, Or sprinkle with dewy tear-drops cheeks and chins, And have the cunning hardihood to say Much on the composition of the world, And in their turn inquire what elements They have themselves,--since, thus the same in kind As a whole mortal creature, even they Must also be from other elements, And then those others from others evermore-- So that thou darest nowhere make a stop.

Oho, I'll follow thee until thou grant The seed (which here thou say'st speaks, laughs, and

thinks) Is yet derived out of other seeds Which in their turn are doing just the same.

But if we see what raving nonsense this, And that a man may laugh, though not, forsooth, Compounded out of laughing elements, And think and utter reason with learn'd speech, Though not himself compounded, for a fact, Of sapient seeds and eloquent, why, then, Cannot those things which we perceive to have Their own sensation be composed as well Of intermixed seeds quite void of sense?

INFINITE WORLDS

Once more, we all from seed celestial spring, To all is that same father, from whom earth, The fostering mother, as she takes the drops Of liquid moisture, pregnant bears her broods-- The s.h.i.+ning grains, and gladsome shrubs and trees, And bears the human race and of the wild The generations all, the while she yields The foods wherewith all feed their frames and lead The genial life and propagate their kind; Wherefore she owneth that maternal name, By old desert. What was before from earth, The same in earth sinks back, and what was sent From sh.o.r.es of ether, that, returning home, The vaults of sky receive. Nor thus doth death So far annihilate things that she destroys The bodies of matter; but she dissipates Their combinations, and conjoins anew One element with others; and contrives That all things vary forms and change their colours And get sensations and straight give them o'er.

And thus may'st know it matters with what others And in what structure the primordial germs Are held together, and what motions they Among themselves do give and get; nor think That aught we see hither and thither afloat Upon the crest of things, and now a birth And straightway now a ruin, inheres at rest Deep in the eternal atoms of the world.

Why, even in these our very verses here It matters much with what and in what order Each element is set: the same denote Sky, and the ocean, lands, and streams, and sun; The same, the grains, and trees, and living things.

And if not all alike, at least the most-- But what distinctions by positions wrought!

And thus no less in things themselves, when once Around are changed the intervals between, The paths of matter, its connections, weights, Blows, clas.h.i.+ngs, motions, order, structure, shapes, The things themselves must likewise changed be.

Now to true reason give thy mind for us.

Since here strange truth is putting forth its might To hit thee in thine ears, a new aspect Of things to show its front. Yet naught there is So easy that it standeth not at first More hard to credit than it after is; And naught soe'er that's great to such degree, Nor wonderful so far, but all mankind Little by little abandon their surprise.

Look upward yonder at the bright clear sky And what it holds--the stars that wander o'er, The moon, the radiance of the splendour-sun: Yet all, if now they first for mortals were, If unforeseen now first asudden shown, What might there be more wonderful to tell, What that the nations would before have dared Less to believe might be?--I fancy, naught-- So strange had been the marvel of that sight.

The which o'erwearied to behold, to-day None deigns look upward to those lucent realms.

Then, spew not reason from thy mind away, Beside thyself because the matter's new, But rather with keen judgment nicely weigh; And if to thee it then appeareth true, Render thy hands, or, if 'tis false at last, Gird thee to combat. For my mind-of-man Now seeks the nature of the vast Beyond There on the other side, that boundless sum Which lies without the ramparts of the world, Toward which the spirit longs to peer afar, Toward which indeed the swift elan of thought Flies unenc.u.mbered forth.

Firstly, we find, Off to all regions round, on either side, Above, beneath, throughout the universe End is there none--as I have taught, as too The very thing of itself declares aloud, And as from nature of the unbottomed deep s.h.i.+nes clearly forth. Nor can we once suppose In any way 'tis likely, (seeing that s.p.a.ce To all sides stretches infinite and free, And seeds, innumerable in number, in sum Bottomless, there in many a manner fly, Bestirred in everlasting motion there), That only this one earth and sky of ours Hath been create and that those bodies of stuff, So many, perform no work outside the same; Seeing, moreover, this world too hath been By nature fas.h.i.+oned, even as seeds of things By innate motion chanced to clash and cling-- After they'd been in many a manner driven Together at random, without design, in vain-- And as at last those seeds together dwelt, Which, when together of a sudden thrown, Should alway furnish the commencements fit Of mighty things--the earth, the sea, the sky, And race of living creatures. Thus, I say, Again, again, 'tmust be confessed there are Such congregations of matter otherwhere, Like this our world which vasty ether holds In huge embrace.

Besides, when matter abundant Is ready there, when s.p.a.ce on hand, nor object Nor any cause r.e.t.a.r.ds, no marvel 'tis That things are carried on and made complete, Perforce. And now, if store of seeds there is So great that not whole life-times of the living Can count the tale...

And if their force and nature abide the same, Able to throw the seeds of things together Into their places, even as here are thrown The seeds together in this world of ours, 'Tmust be confessed in other realms there are Still other worlds, still other breeds of men, And other generations of the wild.

Hence too it happens in the sum there is No one thing single of its kind in birth, And single and sole in growth, but rather it is One member of some generated race, Among full many others of like kind.

First, cast thy mind abroad upon the living: Thou'lt find the race of mountain-ranging wild Even thus to be, and thus the scions of men To be begot, and lastly the mute flocks Of scaled fish, and winged frames of birds.

Wherefore confess we must on grounds the same That earth, sun, moon, and ocean, and all else, Exist not sole and single--rather in number Exceeding number. Since that deeply set Old boundary stone of life remains for them No less, and theirs a body of mortal birth No less, than every kind which here on earth Is so abundant in its members found.

Which well perceived if thou hold in mind, Then Nature, delivered from every haughty lord, And forthwith free, is seen to do all things Herself and through herself of own accord, Rid of all G.o.ds. For--by their holy hearts Which pa.s.s in long tranquillity of peace Untroubled ages and a serene life!-- Who hath the power (I ask), who hath the power To rule the sum of the immeasurable, To hold with steady hand the giant reins Of the unfathomed deep? Who hath the power At once to roll a mult.i.tude of skies, At once to heat with fires ethereal all The fruitful lands of mult.i.tudes of worlds, To be at all times in all places near, To stablish darkness by his clouds, to shake The serene s.p.a.ces of the sky with sound, And hurl his lightnings,--ha, and whelm how oft In ruins his own temples, and to rave, Retiring to the wildernesses, there At practice with that thunderbolt of his, Which yet how often shoots the guilty by, And slays the honourable blameless ones!

Ere since the birth-time of the world, ere since The risen first-born day of sea, earth, sun, Have many germs been added from outside, Have many seeds been added round about, Which the great All, the while it flung them on, Brought hither, that from them the sea and lands Could grow more big, and that the house of heaven Might get more room and raise its lofty roofs Far over earth, and air arise around.

For bodies all, from out all regions, are Divided by blows, each to its proper thing, And all retire to their own proper kinds: The moist to moist retires; earth gets increase From earthy body; and fires, as on a forge, Beat out new fire; and ether forges ether; Till nature, author and ender of the world, Hath led all things to extreme bound of growth: As haps when that which hath been poured inside The vital veins of life is now no more Than that which ebbs within them and runs off.

This is the point where life for each thing ends; This is the point where nature with her powers Curbs all increase. For whatsoe'er thou seest Grow big with glad increase, and step by step Climb upward to ripe age, these to themselves Take in more bodies than they send from selves, Whilst still the food is easily infused Through all the veins, and whilst the things are not So far expanded that they cast away Such numerous atoms as to cause a waste Greater than nutriment whereby they wax.

For 'tmust be granted, truly, that from things Many a body ebbeth and runs off; But yet still more must come, until the things Have touched development's top pinnacle; Then old age breaks their powers and ripe strength And falls away into a worser part.

For ever the ampler and more wide a thing, As soon as ever its augmentation ends, It scatters abroad forthwith to all sides round More bodies, sending them from out itself.

Nor easily now is food disseminate Through all its veins; nor is that food enough To equal with a new supply on hand Those plenteous exhalations it gives off.

Thus, fairly, all things perish, when with ebbing They're made less dense and when from blows without They are laid low; since food at last will fail Extremest eld, and bodies from outside Cease not with thumping to undo a thing And overmaster by infesting blows.

Thus, too, the ramparts of the mighty world On all sides round shall taken be by storm, And tumble to wrack and s.h.i.+vered fragments down.

For food it is must keep things whole, renewing; 'Tis food must prop and give support to all,-- But to no purpose, since nor veins suffice To hold enough, nor nature ministers As much as needful. And even now 'tis thus: Its age is broken and the earth, outworn With many parturitions, scarce creates The little lives--she who created erst All generations and gave forth at birth Enormous bodies of wild beasts of old.

For never, I fancy, did a golden cord From off the firmament above let down The mortal generations to the fields; Nor sea, nor breakers pounding on the rocks Created them; but earth it was who bore-- The same to-day who feeds them from herself.

Besides, herself of own accord, she first The s.h.i.+ning grains and vineyards of all joy Created for mortality; herself Gave the sweet fruitage and the pastures glad, Which now to-day yet scarcely wax in size, Even when aided by our toiling arms.

We break the ox, and wear away the strength Of st.u.r.dy farm-hands; iron tools to-day Barely avail for tilling of the fields, So n.i.g.g.ardly they grudge our harvestings, So much increase our labour. Now to-day The aged ploughman, shaking of his head, Sighs o'er and o'er that labours of his hands Have fallen out in vain, and, as he thinks How present times are not as times of old, Often he praises the fortunes of his sire, And crackles, prating, how the ancient race, Fulfilled with piety, supported life With simple comfort in a narrow plot, Since, man for man, the measure of each field Was smaller far i' the old days. And, again, The gloomy planter of the withered vine Rails at the season's change and wearies heaven, Nor grasps that all of things by sure degrees Are wasting away and going to the tomb, Outworn by venerable length of life.

BOOK III

PROEM

O thou who first uplifted in such dark So clear a torch aloft, who first shed light Upon the profitable ends of man, O thee I follow, glory of the Greeks, And set my footsteps squarely planted now Even in the impress and the marks of thine-- Less like one eager to dispute the palm, More as one craving out of very love That I may copy thee!--for how should swallow Contend with swans or what compare could be In a race between young kids with tumbling legs And the strong might of the horse? Our father thou, And finder-out of truth, and thou to us Suppliest a father's precepts; and from out Those scriven leaves of thine, renowned soul (Like bees that sip of all in flowery wolds), We feed upon thy golden sayings all-- Golden, and ever worthiest endless life.

For soon as ever thy planning thought that sprang From G.o.d-like mind begins its loud proclaim Of nature's courses, terrors of the brain Asunder flee, the ramparts of the world Dispart away, and through the void entire I see the movements of the universe.

Rises to vision the majesty of G.o.ds, And their abodes of everlasting calm Which neither wind may shake nor rain-cloud splash, Nor snow, congealed by sharp frosts, may harm With its white downfall: ever, unclouded sky O'er roofs, and laughs with far-diffused light.

And nature gives to them their all, nor aught May ever pluck their peace of mind away.

But nowhere to my vision rise no more The vaults of Acheron, though the broad earth Bars me no more from gazing down o'er all Which under our feet is going on below Along the void. O, here in these affairs Some new divine delight and trembling awe Takes hold through me, that thus by power of thine Nature, so plain and manifest at last, Hath been on every side laid bare to man!

And since I've taught already of what sort The seeds of all things are, and how, distinct In divers forms, they flit of own accord, Stirred with a motion everlasting on, And in what mode things be from them create, Now, after such matters, should my verse, meseems, Make clear the nature of the mind and soul, And drive that dread of Acheron without, Headlong, which so confounds our human life Unto its deeps, pouring o'er all that is The black of death, nor leaves not anything To prosper--a liquid and unsullied joy.