Book I - Part 04 - Nothing Exists Per Se Except Atoms And The Void Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGHIJKLMNCOPQRS OTUKTVWXYZA2B2C2D2E2 KF2 SG2H2LA2CI2J2PK2L2LO TA2CM2CN2CO2P2WCCQ2R 2S2CT2U2V2U2CU2CCU2X| But now again to weave the tale begun | A |
| All nature then as self sustained consists | B |
| Of twain of things of bodies and of void | C |
| In which they're set and where they're moved around | D |
| For common instinct of our race declares | E |
| That body of itself exists unless | F |
| This primal faith deep founded fail us not | G |
| Naught will there be whereunto to appeal | H |
| On things occult when seeking aught to prove | I |
| By reasonings of mind Again without | J |
| That place and room which we do call the inane | K |
| Nowhere could bodies then be set nor go | L |
| Hither or thither at all as shown before | M |
| Besides there's naught of which thou canst declare | N |
| It lives disjoined from body shut from void | C |
| A kind of third in nature For whatever | O |
| Exists must be a somewhat and the same | P |
| If tangible however fight and slight | Q |
| Will yet increase the count of body's sum | R |
| With its own augmentation big or small | S |
| But if intangible and powerless ever | O |
| To keep a thing from passing through itself | T |
| On any side 'twill be naught else but that | U |
| Which we do call the empty the inane | K |
| Again whate'er exists as of itself | T |
| Must either act or suffer action on it | V |
| Or else be that wherein things move and be | W |
| Naught saving body acts is acted on | X |
| Naught but the inane can furnish room And thus | Y |
| Beside the inane and bodies is no third | Z |
| Nature amid the number of all things | A2 |
| Remainder none to fall at any time | B2 |
| Under our senses nor be seized and seen | C2 |
| By any man through reasonings of mind | D2 |
| Name o'er creation with what names thou wilt | E2 |
| Thou'lt find but properties of those first twain | K |
| Or see but accidents those twain produce | F2 |
| - | |
| A property is that which not at all | S |
| Can be disjoined and severed from a thing | G2 |
| Without a fatal dissolution such | H2 |
| Weight to the rocks heat to the fire and flow | L |
| To the wide waters touch to corporal things | A2 |
| Intangibility to the viewless void | C |
| But state of slavery pauperhood and wealth | I2 |
| Freedom and war and concord and all else | J2 |
| Which come and go whilst Nature stands the same | P |
| We're wont and rightly to call accidents | K2 |
| Even time exists not of itself but sense | L2 |
| Reads out of things what happened long ago | L |
| What presses now and what shall follow after | O |
| No man we must admit feels time itself | T |
| Disjoined from motion and repose of things | A2 |
| Thus when they say there is the ravishment | C |
| Of Princess Helen is the siege and sack | M2 |
| Of Trojan Town look out they force us not | C |
| To admit these acts existent by themselves | N2 |
| Merely because those races of mankind | C |
| Of whom these acts were accidents long since | O2 |
| Irrevocable age has borne away | P2 |
| For all past actions may be said to be | W |
| But accidents in one way of mankind | C |
| In other of some region of the world | C |
| Add too had been no matter and no room | Q2 |
| Wherein all things go on the fire of love | R2 |
| Upblown by that fair form the glowing coal | S2 |
| Under the Phrygian Alexander's breast | C |
| Had ne'er enkindled that renowned strife | T2 |
| Of savage war nor had the wooden horse | U2 |
| Involved in flames old Pergama by a birth | V2 |
| At midnight of a brood of the Hellenes | U2 |
| And thus thou canst remark that every act | C |
| At bottom exists not of itself nor is | U2 |
| As body is nor has like name with void | C |
| But rather of sort more fitly to be called | C |
| An accident of body and of place | U2 |
| Wherein all things go on | X |
Lucretius
(1)
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