De Rerum Natura

Lucretius

Lucretius. De Rerum Natura. William Ellery Leonard. E. P. Dutton. 1916.

  1. Add too: these germs he feigns are far too frail-
  2. If they be germs primordial furnished forth
  3. With but same nature as the things themselves,
  4. And travail and perish equally with those,
  5. And no rein curbs them from annihilation.
  6. For which will last against the grip and crush
  7. Under the teeth of death? the fire? the moist?
  8. Or else the air? which then? the blood? the bones?
  9. No one, methinks, when every thing will be
  10. At bottom as mortal as whate'er we mark
  11. To perish by force before our gazing eyes.
  12. But my appeal is to the proofs above
  13. That things cannot fall back to naught, nor yet
  14. From naught increase. And now again, since food
  15. Augments and nourishes the human frame,
  16. 'Tis thine to know our veins and blood and bones
  17. And thews are formed of particles unlike
  18. To them in kind; or if they say all foods
  19. Are of mixed substance having in themselves
  20. Small bodies of thews, and bones, and also veins
  21. And particles of blood, then every food,
  22. Solid or liquid, must itself be thought
  23. As made and mixed of things unlike in kind-
  24. Of bones, of thews, of ichor and of blood.
  25. Again, if all the bodies which upgrow
  26. From earth, are first within the earth, then earth
  27. Must be compound of alien substances.
  28. Which spring and bloom abroad from out the earth.
  29. Transfer the argument, and thou may'st use
  30. The selfsame words: if flame and smoke and ash
  31. Still lurk unseen within the wood, the wood
  32. Must be compound of alien substances
  33. Which spring from out the wood.
  1. Right here remains
  2. A certain slender means to skulk from truth,
  3. Which Anaxagoras takes unto himself,
  4. Who holds that all things lurk commixed with all
  5. While that one only comes to view, of which
  6. The bodies exceed in number all the rest,
  7. And lie more close to hand and at the fore-
  8. A notion banished from true reason far.
  9. For then 'twere meet that kernels of the grains
  10. Should oft, when crunched between the might of stones,
  11. Give forth a sign of blood, or of aught else
  12. Which in our human frame is fed; and that
  13. Rock rubbed on rock should yield a gory ooze.
  14. Likewise the herbs ought oft to give forth drops
  15. Of sweet milk, flavoured like the uddered sheep's;
  16. Indeed we ought to find, when crumbling up
  17. The earthy clods, there herbs, and grains, and leaves,
  18. All sorts dispersed minutely in the soil;
  19. Lastly we ought to find in cloven wood
  20. Ashes and smoke and bits of fire there hid.
  21. But since fact teaches this is not the case,
  22. 'Tis thine to know things are not mixed with things
  23. Thuswise; but seeds, common to many things,
  24. Commixed in many ways, must lurk in things.
  25. "But often it happens on skiey hills" thou sayest,
  26. "That neighbouring tops of lofty trees are rubbed
  27. One against other, smote by the blustering south,
  28. Till all ablaze with bursting flower of flame."
  29. Good sooth- yet fire is not ingraft in wood,
  30. But many are the seeds of heat, and when
  31. Rubbing together they together flow,
  32. They start the conflagrations in the forests.
  33. Whereas if flame, already fashioned, lay
  34. Stored up within the forests, then the fires
  35. Could not for any time be kept unseen,
  36. But would be laying all the wildwood waste
  37. And burning all the boscage. Now dost see
  38. (Even as we said a little space above)
  39. How mightily it matters with what others,
  40. In what positions these same primal germs
  41. Are bound together? And what motions, too,
  42. They give and get among themselves? how, hence,
  43. The same, if altered 'mongst themselves, can body
  44. Both igneous and ligneous objects forth-
  45. Precisely as these words themselves are made
  46. By somewhat altering their elements,
  47. Although we mark with name indeed distinct
  48. The igneous from the ligneous. Once again,
  49. If thou suppose whatever thou beholdest,
  50. Among all visible objects, cannot be,
  51. Unless thou feign bodies of matter endowed
  52. With a like nature,- by thy vain device
  53. For thee will perish all the germs of things:
  54. 'Twill come to pass they'll laugh aloud, like men,
  55. Shaken asunder by a spasm of mirth,
  56. Or moisten with salty tear-drops cheeks and chins.