De Rerum Natura

Lucretius

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

  1. And first,
  2. Since body of earth and water, air's light breath,
  3. And fiery exhalations (of which four
  4. This sum of things is seen to be compact)
  5. So all have birth and perishable frame,
  6. Thus the whole nature of the world itself
  7. Must be conceived as perishable too.
  8. For, verily, those things of which we see
  9. The parts and members to have birth in time
  10. And perishable shapes, those same we mark
  11. To be invariably born in time
  12. And born to die. And therefore when I see
  13. The mightiest members and the parts of this
  14. Our world consumed and begot again,
  15. 'Tis mine to know that also sky above
  16. And earth beneath began of old in time
  17. And shall in time go under to disaster.
  18. And lest in these affairs thou deemest me
  19. To have seized upon this point by sleight to serve
  20. My own caprice- because I have assumed
  21. That earth and fire are mortal things indeed,
  22. And have not doubted water and the air
  23. Both perish too and have affirmed the same
  24. To be again begotten and wax big-
  25. Mark well the argument: in first place, lo,
  26. Some certain parts of earth, grievously parched
  27. By unremitting suns, and trampled on
  28. By a vast throng of feet, exhale abroad
  29. A powdery haze and flying clouds of dust,
  30. Which the stout winds disperse in the whole air.
  31. A part, moreover, of her sod and soil
  32. Is summoned to inundation by the rains;
  33. And rivers graze and gouge the banks away.
  34. Besides, whatever takes a part its own
  35. In fostering and increasing [aught]...
  36. . . . . . .
  37. Is rendered back; and since, beyond a doubt,
  38. Earth, the all-mother, is beheld to be
  39. Likewise the common sepulchre of things,
  40. Therefore thou seest her minished of her plenty,
  41. And then again augmented with new growth.
  1. And for the rest, that sea, and streams, and springs
  2. Forever with new waters overflow,
  3. And that perennially the fluids well,
  4. Needeth no words- the mighty flux itself
  5. Of multitudinous waters round about
  6. Declareth this. But whatso water first
  7. Streams up is ever straightway carried off,
  8. And thus it comes to pass that all in all
  9. There is no overflow; in part because
  10. The burly winds (that over-sweep amain)
  11. And skiey sun (that with his rays dissolves)
  12. Do minish the level seas; in part because
  13. The water is diffused underground
  14. Through all the lands. The brine is filtered off,
  15. And then the liquid stuff seeps back again
  16. And all regathers at the river-heads,
  17. Whence in fresh-water currents on it flows
  18. Over the lands, adown the channels which
  19. Were cleft erstwhile and erstwhile bore along
  20. The liquid-footed floods.
  1. Now, then, of air
  2. I'll speak, which hour by hour in all its body
  3. Is changed innumerably. For whatso'er
  4. Streams up in dust or vapour off of things,
  5. The same is all and always borne along
  6. Into the mighty ocean of the air;
  7. And did not air in turn restore to things
  8. Bodies, and thus recruit them as they stream,
  9. All things by this time had resolved been
  10. And changed into air. Therefore it never
  11. Ceases to be engendered off of things
  12. And to return to things, since verily
  13. In constant flux do all things stream.
  1. Likewise,
  2. The abounding well-spring of the liquid light,
  3. The ethereal sun, doth flood the heaven o'er
  4. With constant flux of radiance ever new,
  5. And with fresh light supplies the place of light,
  6. Upon the instant. For whatever effulgence
  7. Hath first streamed off, no matter where it falls,
  8. Is lost unto the sun. And this 'tis thine
  9. To know from these examples: soon as clouds
  10. Have first begun to under-pass the sun,
  11. And, as it were, to rend the rays of light
  12. In twain, at once the lower part of them
  13. Is lost entire, and earth is overcast
  14. Where'er the thunderheads are rolled along-
  15. So know thou mayst that things forever need
  16. A fresh replenishment of gleam and glow,
  17. And each effulgence, foremost flashed forth,
  18. Perisheth one by one. Nor otherwise
  19. Can things be seen in sunlight, lest alway
  20. The fountain-head of light supply new light.
  21. Indeed your earthly beacons of the night,
  22. The hanging lampions and the torches, bright
  23. With darting gleams and dense with livid soot,
  24. Do hurry in like manner to supply
  25. With ministering heat new light amain;
  26. Are all alive to quiver with their fires,-
  27. Are so alive, that thus the light ne'er leaves
  28. The spots it shines on, as if rent in twain:
  29. So speedily is its destruction veiled
  30. By the swift birth of flame from all the fires.
  31. Thus, then, we must suppose that sun and moon
  32. And stars dart forth their light from under-births
  33. Ever and ever new, and whatso flames
  34. First rise do perish always one by one-
  35. Lest, haply, thou shouldst think they each endure
  36. Inviolable.