On the Nature of Things

CHARACTER OF THE ATOMS

                           Bodies, again,     Are partly primal germs of things, and partly     Unions deriving from the primal germs.     And those which are the primal germs of things     No power can quench; for in the end they conquer     By their own solidness; though hard it be     To think that aught in things has solid frame;     For lightnings pass, no less than voice and shout,     Through hedging walls of houses, and the iron     White-dazzles in the fire, and rocks will burn     With exhalations fierce and burst asunder.     Totters the rigid gold dissolved in heat;     The ice of bronze melts conquered in the flame;     Warmth and the piercing cold through silver seep,     Since, with the cups held rightly in the hand,     We oft feel both, as from above is poured     The dew of waters between their shining sides:     So true it is no solid form is found.     But yet because true reason and nature of things     Constrain us, come, whilst in few verses now     I disentangle how there still exist     Bodies of solid, everlasting frame—     The seeds of things, the primal germs we teach,     Whence all creation around us came to be.     First since we know a twofold nature exists,     Of things, both twain and utterly unlike—     Body, and place in which an things go on—     Then each must be both for and through itself,     And all unmixed: where'er be empty space,     There body's not; and so where body bides,     There not at all exists the void inane.     Thus primal bodies are solid, without a void.     But since there's void in all begotten things,     All solid matter must be round the same;     Nor, by true reason canst thou prove aught hides     And holds a void within its body, unless     Thou grant what holds it be a solid. Know,     That which can hold a void of things within     Can be naught else than matter in union knit.     Thus matter, consisting of a solid frame,     Hath power to be eternal, though all else,     Though all creation, be dissolved away.     Again, were naught of empty and inane,     The world were then a solid; as, without     Some certain bodies to fill the places held,     The world that is were but a vacant void.     And so, infallibly, alternate-wise     Body and void are still distinguished,     Since nature knows no wholly full nor void.     There are, then, certain bodies, possessed of power     To vary forever the empty and the full;     And these can nor be sundered from without     By beats and blows, nor from within be torn     By penetration, nor be overthrown     By any assault soever through the world—     For without void, naught can be crushed, it seems,     Nor broken, nor severed by a cut in twain,     Nor can it take the damp, or seeping cold     Or piercing fire, those old destroyers three;     But the more void within a thing, the more     Entirely it totters at their sure assault.     Thus if first bodies be, as I have taught,     Solid, without a void, they must be then     Eternal; and, if matter ne'er had been     Eternal, long ere now had all things gone     Back into nothing utterly, and all     We see around from nothing had been born—     But since I taught above that naught can be     From naught created, nor the once begotten     To naught be summoned back, these primal germs     Must have an immortality of frame.     And into these must each thing be resolved,     When comes its supreme hour, that thus there be     At hand the stuff for plenishing the world.     So primal germs have solid singleness     Nor otherwise could they have been conserved     Through aeons and infinity of time     For the replenishment of wasted worlds.     Once more, if nature had given a scope for things     To be forever broken more and more,     By now the bodies of matter would have been     So far reduced by breakings in old days     That from them nothing could, at season fixed,     Be born, and arrive its prime and top of life.     For, lo, each thing is quicker marred than made;     And so whate'er the long infinitude     Of days and all fore-passed time would now     By this have broken and ruined and dissolved,     That same could ne'er in all remaining time     Be builded up for plenishing the world.     But mark: infallibly a fixed bound     Remaineth stablished 'gainst their breaking down;     Since we behold each thing soever renewed,     And unto all, their seasons, after their kind,     Wherein they arrive the flower of their age.       Again, if bounds have not been set against     The breaking down of this corporeal world,     Yet must all bodies of whatever things     Have still endured from everlasting time     Unto this present, as not yet assailed     By shocks of peril. But because the same     Are, to thy thinking, of a nature frail,     It ill accords that thus they could remain     (As thus they do) through everlasting time,     Vexed through the ages (as indeed they are)     By the innumerable blows of chance.     So in our programme of creation, mark     How 'tis that, though the bodies of all stuff     Are solid to the core, we yet explain     The ways whereby some things are fashioned soft—     Air, water, earth, and fiery exhalations—     And by what force they function and go on:     The fact is founded in the void of things.     But if the primal germs themselves be soft,     Reason cannot be brought to bear to show     The ways whereby may be created these     Great crags of basalt and the during iron;     For their whole nature will profoundly lack     The first foundations of a solid frame.     But powerful in old simplicity,     Abide the solid, the primeval germs;     And by their combinations more condensed,     All objects can be tightly knit and bound     And made to show unconquerable strength.     Again, since all things kind by kind obtain     Fixed bounds of growing and conserving life;     Since Nature hath inviolably decreed     What each can do, what each can never do;     Since naught is changed, but all things so abide     That ever the variegated birds reveal     The spots or stripes peculiar to their kind,     Spring after spring: thus surely all that is     Must be composed of matter immutable.     For if the primal germs in any wise     Were open to conquest and to change, 'twould be     Uncertain also what could come to birth     And what could not, and by what law to each     Its scope prescribed, its boundary stone that clings     So deep in Time. Nor could the generations     Kind after kind so often reproduce     The nature, habits, motions, ways of life,     Of their progenitors.                                 And then again,     Since there is ever an extreme bounding point     Of that first body which our senses now     Cannot perceive: That bounding point indeed     Exists without all parts, a minimum     Of nature, nor was e'er a thing apart,     As of itself,—nor shall hereafter be,     Since 'tis itself still parcel of another,     A first and single part, whence other parts     And others similar in order lie     In a packed phalanx, filling to the full     The nature of first body: being thus     Not self-existent, they must cleave to that     From which in nowise they can sundered be.     So primal germs have solid singleness,     Which tightly packed and closely joined cohere     By virtue of their minim particles—     No compound by mere union of the same;     But strong in their eternal singleness,     Nature, reserving them as seeds for things,     Permitteth naught of rupture or decrease.     Moreover, were there not a minimum,     The smallest bodies would have infinites,     Since then a half-of-half could still be halved,     With limitless division less and less.     Then what the difference 'twixt the sum and least?     None: for however infinite the sum,     Yet even the smallest would consist the same     Of infinite parts. But since true reason here     Protests, denying that the mind can think it,     Convinced thou must confess such things there are     As have no parts, the minimums of nature.     And since these are, likewise confess thou must     That primal bodies are solid and eterne.     Again, if Nature, creatress of all things,     Were wont to force all things to be resolved     Unto least parts, then would she not avail     To reproduce from out them anything;     Because whate'er is not endowed with parts     Cannot possess those properties required     Of generative stuff—divers connections,     Weights, blows, encounters, motions, whereby things     Forevermore have being and go on.

CONFUTATION OF OTHER PHILOSOPHERS

     And on such grounds it is that those who held     The stuff of things is fire, and out of fire     Alone the cosmic sum is formed, are seen     Mightily from true reason to have lapsed.     Of whom, chief leader to do battle, comes     That Heraclitus, famous for dark speech     Among the silly, not the serious Greeks     Who search for truth. For dolts are ever prone     That to bewonder and adore which hides     Beneath distorted words, holding that true     Which sweetly tickles in their stupid ears,     Or which is rouged in finely finished phrase.     For how, I ask, can things so varied be,     If formed of fire, single and pure? No whit     'Twould help for fire to be condensed or thinned,     If all the parts of fire did still preserve     But fire's own nature, seen before in gross.     The heat were keener with the parts compressed,     Milder, again, when severed or dispersed—     And more than this thou canst conceive of naught     That from such causes could become; much less     Might earth's variety of things be born     From any fires soever, dense or rare.     This too: if they suppose a void in things,     Then fires can be condensed and still left rare;     But since they see such opposites of thought     Rising against them, and are loath to leave     An unmixed void in things, they fear the steep     And lose the road of truth. Nor do they see,     That, if from things we take away the void,     All things are then condensed, and out of all     One body made, which has no power to dart     Swiftly from out itself not anything—     As throws the fire its light and warmth around,     Giving thee proof its parts are not compact.     But if perhaps they think, in other wise,     Fires through their combinations can be quenched     And change their substance, very well: behold,     If fire shall spare to do so in no part,     Then heat will perish utterly and all,     And out of nothing would the world be formed.     For change in anything from out its bounds     Means instant death of that which was before;     And thus a somewhat must persist unharmed     Amid the world, lest all return to naught,     And, born from naught, abundance thrive anew.     Now since indeed there are those surest bodies     Which keep their nature evermore the same,     Upon whose going out and coming in     And changed order things their nature change,     And all corporeal substances transformed,     'Tis thine to know those primal bodies, then,     Are not of fire. For 'twere of no avail     Should some depart and go away, and some     Be added new, and some be changed in order,     If still all kept their nature of old heat:     For whatsoever they created then     Would still in any case be only fire.     The truth, I fancy, this: bodies there are     Whose clashings, motions, order, posture, shapes     Produce the fire and which, by order changed,     Do change the nature of the thing produced,     And are thereafter nothing like to fire     Nor whatso else has power to send its bodies     With impact touching on the senses' touch.     Again, to say that all things are but fire     And no true thing in number of all things     Exists but fire, as this same fellow says,     Seems crazed folly. For the man himself     Against the senses by the senses fights,     And hews at that through which is all belief,     Through which indeed unto himself is known     The thing he calls the fire. For, though he thinks     The senses truly can perceive the fire,     He thinks they cannot as regards all else,     Which still are palpably as clear to sense—     To me a thought inept and crazy too.     For whither shall we make appeal? for what     More certain than our senses can there be     Whereby to mark asunder error and truth?     Besides, why rather do away with all,     And wish to allow heat only, then deny     The fire and still allow all else to be?—     Alike the madness either way it seems.     Thus whosoe'er have held the stuff of things     To be but fire, and out of fire the sum,     And whosoever have constituted air     As first beginning of begotten things,     And all whoever have held that of itself     Water alone contrives things, or that earth     Createth all and changes things anew     To divers natures, mightily they seem     A long way to have wandered from the truth.     Add, too, whoever make the primal stuff     Twofold, by joining air to fire, and earth     To water; add who deem that things can grow     Out of the four—fire, earth, and breath, and rain;     As first Empedocles of Acragas,     Whom that three-cornered isle of all the lands     Bore on her coasts, around which flows and flows     In mighty bend and bay the Ionic seas,     Splashing the brine from off their gray-green waves.     Here, billowing onward through the narrow straits,     Swift ocean cuts her boundaries from the shores     Of the Italic mainland. Here the waste     Charybdis; and here Aetna rumbles threats     To gather anew such furies of its flames     As with its force anew to vomit fires,     Belched from its throat, and skyward bear anew     Its lightnings' flash. And though for much she seem     The mighty and the wondrous isle to men,     Most rich in all good things, and fortified     With generous strength of heroes, she hath ne'er     Possessed within her aught of more renown,     Nor aught more holy, wonderful, and dear     Than this true man. Nay, ever so far and pure     The lofty music of his breast divine     Lifts up its voice and tells of glories found,     That scarce he seems of human stock create.     Yet he and those forementioned (known to be     So far beneath him, less than he in all),     Though, as discoverers of much goodly truth,     They gave, as 'twere from out of the heart's own shrine,     Responses holier and soundlier based     Than ever the Pythia pronounced for men     From out the triped and the Delphian laurel,     Have still in matter of first-elements     Made ruin of themselves, and, great men, great     Indeed and heavy there for them the fall:     First, because, banishing the void from things,     They yet assign them motion, and allow     Things soft and loosely textured to exist,     As air, dew, fire, earth, animals, and grains,     Without admixture of void amid their frame.     Next, because, thinking there can be no end     In cutting bodies down to less and less     Nor pause established to their breaking up,     They hold there is no minimum in things;     Albeit we see the boundary point of aught     Is that which to our senses seems its least,     Whereby thou mayst conjecture, that, because     The things thou canst not mark have boundary points,     They surely have their minimums. Then, too,     Since these philosophers ascribe to things     Soft primal germs, which we behold to be     Of birth and body mortal, thus, throughout,     The sum of things must be returned to naught,     And, born from naught, abundance thrive anew—     Thou seest how far each doctrine stands from truth.     And, next, these bodies are among themselves     In many ways poisons and foes to each,     Wherefore their congress will destroy them quite     Or drive asunder as we see in storms     Rains, winds, and lightnings all asunder fly.     Thus too, if all things are create of four,     And all again dissolved into the four,     How can the four be called the primal germs     Of things, more than all things themselves be thought,     By retroversion, primal germs of them?     For ever alternately are both begot,     With interchange of nature and aspect     From immemorial time. But if percase     Thou think'st the frame of fire and earth, the air,     The dew of water can in such wise meet     As not by mingling to resign their nature,     From them for thee no world can be create—     No thing of breath, no stock or stalk of tree:     In the wild congress of this varied heap     Each thing its proper nature will display,     And air will palpably be seen mixed up     With earth together, unquenched heat with water.     But primal germs in bringing things to birth     Must have a latent, unseen quality,     Lest some outstanding alien element     Confuse and minish in the thing create     Its proper being.                        But these men begin     From heaven, and from its fires; and first they feign     That fire will turn into the winds of air,     Next, that from air the rain begotten is,     And earth created out of rain, and then     That all, reversely, are returned from earth—     The moisture first, then air thereafter heat—     And that these same ne'er cease in interchange,     To go their ways from heaven to earth, from earth     Unto the stars of the aethereal world—     Which in no wise at all the germs can do.     Since an immutable somewhat still must be,     Lest all things utterly be sped to naught;     For change in anything from out its bounds     Means instant death of that which was before.     Wherefore, since those things, mentioned heretofore,     Suffer a changed state, they must derive     From others ever unconvertible,     Lest an things utterly return to naught.     Then why not rather presuppose there be     Bodies with such a nature furnished forth     That, if perchance they have created fire,     Can still (by virtue of a few withdrawn,     Or added few, and motion and order changed)     Fashion the winds of air, and thus all things     Forevermore be interchanged with all?     "But facts in proof are manifest," thou sayest,     "That all things grow into the winds of air     And forth from earth are nourished, and unless     The season favour at propitious hour     With rains enough to set the trees a-reel     Under the soak of bulking thunderheads,     And sun, for its share, foster and give heat,     No grains, nor trees, nor breathing things can grow."     True—and unless hard food and moisture soft     Recruited man, his frame would waste away,     And life dissolve from out his thews and bones;     For out of doubt recruited and fed are we     By certain things, as other things by others.     Because in many ways the many germs     Common to many things are mixed in things,     No wonder 'tis that therefore divers things     By divers things are nourished. And, again,     Often it matters vastly with what others,     In what positions the primordial germs     Are bound together, and what motions, too,     They give and get among themselves; for these     Same germs do put together sky, sea, lands,     Rivers, and sun, grains, trees, and breathing things,     But yet commixed they are in divers modes     With divers things, forever as they move.     Nay, thou beholdest in our verses here     Elements many, common to many worlds,     Albeit thou must confess each verse, each word     From one another differs both in sense     And ring of sound—so much the elements     Can bring about by change of order alone.     But those which are the primal germs of things     Have power to work more combinations still,     Whence divers things can be produced in turn.     Now let us also take for scrutiny     The homeomeria of Anaxagoras,     So called by Greeks, for which our pauper-speech     Yieldeth no name in the Italian tongue,     Although the thing itself is not o'erhard     For explanation. First, then, when he speaks     Of this homeomeria of things, he thinks     Bones to be sprung from littlest bones minute,     And from minute and littlest flesh all flesh,     And blood created out of drops of blood,     Conceiving gold compact of grains of gold,     And earth concreted out of bits of earth,     Fire made of fires, and water out of waters,     Feigning the like with all the rest of stuff.     Yet he concedes not any void in things,     Nor any limit to cutting bodies down.     Wherefore to me he seems on both accounts     To err no less than those we named before.     Add too: these germs he feigns are far too frail—     If they be germs primordial furnished forth     With but same nature as the things themselves,     And travail and perish equally with those,     And no rein curbs them from annihilation.     For which will last against the grip and crush     Under the teeth of death? the fire? the moist?     Or else the air? which then? the blood? the bones?     No one, methinks, when every thing will be     At bottom as mortal as whate'er we mark     To perish by force before our gazing eyes.     But my appeal is to the proofs above     That things cannot fall back to naught, nor yet     From naught increase. And now again, since food     Augments and nourishes the human frame,     'Tis thine to know our veins and blood and bones     And thews are formed of particles unlike     To them in kind; or if they say all foods     Are of mixed substance having in themselves     Small bodies of thews, and bones, and also veins     And particles of blood, then every food,     Solid or liquid, must itself be thought     As made and mixed of things unlike in kind—     Of bones, of thews, of ichor and of blood.     Again, if all the bodies which upgrow     From earth, are first within the earth, then earth     Must be compound of alien substances.     Which spring and bloom abroad from out the earth.     Transfer the argument, and thou may'st use     The selfsame words: if flame and smoke and ash     Still lurk unseen within the wood, the wood     Must be compound of alien substances     Which spring from out the wood.                               Right here remains     A certain slender means to skulk from truth,     Which Anaxagoras takes unto himself,     Who holds that all things lurk commixed with all     While that one only comes to view, of which     The bodies exceed in number all the rest,     And lie more close to hand and at the fore—     A notion banished from true reason far.     For then 'twere meet that kernels of the grains     Should oft, when crunched between the might of stones,     Give forth a sign of blood, or of aught else     Which in our human frame is fed; and that     Rock rubbed on rock should yield a gory ooze.     Likewise the herbs ought oft to give forth drops     Of sweet milk, flavoured like the uddered sheep's;     Indeed we ought to find, when crumbling up     The earthy clods, there herbs, and grains, and leaves,     All sorts dispersed minutely in the soil;     Lastly we ought to find in cloven wood     Ashes and smoke and bits of fire there hid.     But since fact teaches this is not the case,     'Tis thine to know things are not mixed with things     Thuswise; but seeds, common to many things,     Commixed in many ways, must lurk in things.     "But often it happens on skiey hills" thou sayest,     "That neighbouring tops of lofty trees are rubbed     One against other, smote by the blustering south,     Till all ablaze with bursting flower of flame."     Good sooth—yet fire is not ingraft in wood,     But many are the seeds of heat, and when     Rubbing together they together flow,     They start the conflagrations in the forests.     Whereas if flame, already fashioned, lay     Stored up within the forests, then the fires     Could not for any time be kept unseen,     But would be laying all the wildwood waste     And burning all the boscage. Now dost see     (Even as we said a little space above)     How mightily it matters with what others,     In what positions these same primal germs     Are bound together? And what motions, too,     They give and get among themselves? how, hence,     The same, if altered 'mongst themselves, can body     Both igneous and ligneous objects forth—     Precisely as these words themselves are made     By somewhat altering their elements,     Although we mark with name indeed distinct     The igneous from the ligneous. Once again,     If thou suppose whatever thou beholdest,     Among all visible objects, cannot be,     Unless thou feign bodies of matter endowed     With a like nature,—by thy vain device     For thee will perish all the germs of things:     'Twill come to pass they'll laugh aloud, like men,     Shaken asunder by a spasm of mirth,     Or moisten with salty tear-drops cheeks and chins.

THE INFINITY OF THE UNIVERSE