De Rerum Natura

Lucretius

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

  1. In these affairs
  2. We crave that thou wilt passionately flee
  3. The one offence, and anxiously wilt shun
  4. The error of presuming the clear lights
  5. Of eyes created were that we might see;
  6. Or thighs and knees, aprop upon the feet,
  7. Thuswise can bended be, that we might step
  8. With goodly strides ahead; or forearms joined
  9. Unto the sturdy uppers, or serving hands
  10. On either side were given, that we might do
  11. Life's own demands. All such interpretation
  12. Is aft-for-fore with inverse reasoning,
  13. Since naught is born in body so that we
  14. May use the same, but birth engenders use:
  15. No seeing ere the lights of eyes were born,
  16. No speaking ere the tongue created was;
  17. But origin of tongue came long before
  18. Discourse of words, and ears created were
  19. Much earlier than any sound was heard;
  20. And all the members, so meseems, were there
  21. Before they got their use: and therefore, they
  22. Could not be gendered for the sake of use.
  23. But contrariwise, contending in the fight
  24. With hand to hand, and rending of the joints,
  25. And fouling of the limbs with gore, was there,
  26. O long before the gleaming spears ere flew;
  27. And nature prompted man to shun a wound,
  28. Before the left arm by the aid of art
  29. Opposed the shielding targe. And, verily,
  30. Yielding the weary body to repose,
  31. Far ancienter than cushions of soft beds,
  32. And quenching thirst is earlier than cups.
  33. These objects, therefore, which for use and life
  34. Have been devised, can be conceived as found
  35. For sake of using. But apart from such
  36. Are all which first were born and afterwards
  37. Gave knowledge of their own utility-
  38. Chief in which sort we note the senses, limbs:
  39. Wherefore, again, 'tis quite beyond thy power
  40. To hold that these could thus have been create
  41. For office of utility.
  1. Likewise,
  2. 'Tis nothing strange that all the breathing creatures
  3. Seek, even by nature of their frame, their food.
  4. Yes, since I've taught thee that from off the things
  5. Stream and depart innumerable bodies
  6. In modes innumerable too; but most
  7. Must be the bodies streaming from the living-
  8. Which bodies, vexed by motion evermore,
  9. Are through the mouth exhaled innumerable,
  10. When weary creatures pant, or through the sweat
  11. Squeezed forth innumerable from deep within.
  12. Thus body rarefies, so undermined
  13. In all its nature, and pain attends its state.
  14. And so the food is taken to underprop
  15. The tottering joints, and by its interfusion
  16. To re-create their powers, and there stop up
  17. The longing, open-mouthed through limbs and veins,
  18. For eating. And the moist no less departs
  19. Into all regions that demand the moist;
  20. And many heaped-up particles of hot,
  21. Which cause such burnings in these bellies of ours,
  22. The liquid on arriving dissipates
  23. And quenches like a fire, that parching heat
  24. No longer now can scorch the frame. And so,
  25. Thou seest how panting thirst is washed away
  26. From off our body, how the hunger-pang
  27. It, too, appeased.