De Rerum Natura

Lucretius

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

  1. And most in autumn is shaken the house of heaven,
  2. The house so studded with the glittering stars,
  3. And the whole earth around- most too in spring
  4. When flowery times unfold themselves: for, lo,
  5. In the cold season is there lack of fire,
  6. And winds are scanty in the hot, and clouds
  7. Have not so dense a bulk. But when, indeed,
  8. The seasons of heaven are betwixt these twain,
  9. The divers causes of the thunderbolt
  10. Then all concur; for then both cold and heat
  11. Are mixed in the cross-seas of the year,
  12. So that a discord rises among things
  13. And air in vast tumultuosity
  14. Billows, infuriate with the fires and winds-
  15. Of which the both are needed by the cloud
  16. For fabrication of the thunderbolt.
  17. For the first part of heat and last of cold
  18. Is the time of spring; wherefore must things unlike
  19. Do battle one with other, and, when mixed,
  20. Tumultuously rage. And when rolls round
  21. The latest heat mixed with the earliest chill-
  22. The time which bears the name of autumn- then
  23. Likewise fierce cold-spells wrestle with fierce heats.
  24. On this account these seasons of the year
  25. Are nominated "cross-seas."- And no marvel
  26. If in those times the thunderbolts prevail
  27. And storms are roused turbulent in heaven,
  28. Since then both sides in dubious warfare rage
  29. Tumultuously, the one with flames, the other
  30. With winds and with waters mixed with winds.