Book I - Part 06 - Confutation Of Other Philosophers Poem Rhyme Scheme

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And on such grounds it is that those who held	A
The stuff of things is fire and out of fire	B
Alone the cosmic sum is formed are seen	C
Mightily from true reason to have lapsed	D
Of whom chief leader to do battle comes	E
That Heraclitus famous for dark speech	F
Among the silly not the serious Greeks	G
Who search for truth For dolts are ever prone	H
That to bewonder and adore which hides	I
Beneath distorted words holding that true	J
Which sweetly tickles in their stupid ears	K
Or which is rouged in finely finished phrase	L
For how I ask can things so varied be	M
If formed of fire single and pure No whit	N
'Twould help for fire to be condensed or thinned	O
If all the parts of fire did still preserve	P
But fire's own nature seen before in gross	Q
The heat were keener with the parts compressed	R
Milder again when severed or dispersed	S
And more than this thou canst conceive of naught	T
That from such causes could become much less	U
Might earth's variety of things be born	V
From any fires soever dense or rare	W
This too if they suppose a void in things	X
Then fires can be condensed and still left rare	W
But since they see such opposites of thought	T
Rising against them and are loath to leave	Y
An unmixed void in things they fear the steep	Z
And lose the road of truth Nor do they see	M
That if from things we take away the void	A2
All things are then condensed and out of all	B2
One body made which has no power to dart	C2
Swiftly from out itself not anything	D2
As throws the fire its light and warmth around	E2
Giving thee proof its parts are not compact	F2
But if perhaps they think in other wise	G2
Fires through their combinations can be quenched	F2
And change their substance very well behold	F2
If fire shall spare to do so in no part	F2
Then heat will perish utterly and all	B2
And out of nothing would the world be formed	F2
For change in anything from out its bounds	H2
Means instant death of that which was before	I2
And thus a somewhat must persist unharmed	F2
Amid the world lest all return to naught	F2
And born from naught abundance thrive anew	J
Now since indeed there are those surest bodies	J2
Which keep their nature evermore the same	K2
Upon whose going out and coming in	L2
And changed order things their nature change	M2
And all corporeal substances transformed	F2
'Tis thine to know those primal bodies then	N2
Are not of fire For 'twere of no avail	O2
Should some depart and go away and some	P2
Be added new and some be changed in order	B
If still all kept their nature of old heat	F2
For whatsoever they created then	N2
Would still in any case be only fire	B
The truth I fancy this bodies there are	Q2
Whose clashings motions order posture shapes	R2
Produce the fire and which by order changed	F2
Do change the nature of the thing produced	F2
And are thereafter nothing like to fire	B
Nor whatso else has power to send its bodies	J2
With impact touching on the senses' touch	S2
	-
Again to say that all things are but fire	B
And no true thing in number of all things	X
Exists but fire as this same fellow says	T2
Seems crazed folly For the man himself	U2
Against the senses by the senses fights	V2
And hews at that through which is all belief	W2
Through which indeed unto himself is known	H
The thing he calls the fire For though he thinks	X2
The senses truly can perceive the fire	B
He thinks they cannot as regards all else	Y2
Which still are palpably as clear to sense	Z2
To me a thought inept and crazy too	J
For whither shall we make appeal for what	F2
More certain than our senses can there be	M
Whereby to mark asunder error and truth	A3
Besides why rather do away with all	B2
And wish to allow heat only then deny	B3
The fire and still allow all else to be	M
Alike the madness either way it seems	C3
Thus whosoe'er have held the stuff of things	X
To be but fire and out of fire the sum	P2
And whosoever have constituted air	W
As first beginning of begotten things	X
And all whoever have held that of itself	U2
Water alone contrives things or that earth	D3
Createth all and changes things anew	J
To divers natures mightily they seem	E3
A long way to have wandered from the truth	A3
	-
Add too whoever make the primal stuff	F3
Twofold by joining air to fire and earth	D3
To water add who deem that things can grow	G3
Out of the four fire earth and breath and rain	H3
As first Empedocles of Acragas	X
Whom that three cornered isle of all the lands	X
Bore on her coasts around which flows and flows	X
In mighty bend and bay the Ionic seas	X
Splashing the brine from off their gray green waves	X
Here billowing onward through the narrow straits	X
Swift ocean cuts her boundaries from the shores	X
Of the Italic mainland Here the waste	F2
Charybdis and here Aetna rumbles threats	X
To gather anew such furies of its flames	X
As with its force anew to vomit fires	X
Belched from its throat and skyward bear anew	J
Its lightnings' flash And though for much she seem	E3
The mighty and the wondrous isle to men	N2
Most rich in all good things and fortified	F2
With generous strength of heroes she hath ne'er	W
Possessed within her aught of more renown	I3
Nor aught more holy wonderful and dear	J3
Than this true man Nay ever so far and pure	K3
The lofty music of his breast divine	L3
Lifts up its voice and tells of glories found	F2
That scarce he seems of human stock create	F2
	-
Yet he and those forementioned known to be	M
So far beneath him less than he in all	B2
Though as discoverers of much goodly truth	A3
They gave as 'twere from out of the heart's own shrine	L3
Responses holier and soundlier based	F2
Than ever the Pythia pronounced for men	N2
From out the tripod and the Delphian laurel	M3
Have still in matter of first elements	X
Made ruin of themselves and great men great	F2
Indeed and heavy there for them the fall	B2
First because banishing the void from things	X
They yet assign them motion and allow	N3
Things soft and loosely textured to exist	F2
As air dew fire earth animals and grains	X
Without admixture of void amid their frame	K2
Next because thinking there can be no end	F2
In cutting bodies down to less and less	X
Nor pause established to their breaking up	O3
They hold there is no minimum in things	X
Albeit we see the boundary point of aught	F2
Is that which to our senses seems its least	F2
Whereby thou mayst conjecture that because	X
The things thou canst not mark have boundary points	X
They surely have their minimums Then too	F2
Since these philosophers ascribe to things	X
Soft primal germs which we behold to be	M
Of birth and body mortal thus throughout	F2
The sum of things must be returned to naught	F2
And born from naught abundance thrive anew	F2
Thou seest how far each doctrine stands from truth	A3
And next these bodies are among themselves	X
In many ways poisons and foes to each	F
Wherefore their congress will destroy them quite	F2
Or drive asunder as we see in storms	X
Rains winds and lightnings all asunder fly	B3
Thus too if all things are create of four	I2
And all again dissolved into the four	I2
How can the four be called the primal germs	X
Of things more than all things themselves be thought	F2
By retroversion primal germs of them	P3
For ever alternately are both begot	F2
With interchange of nature and aspect	F2
From immemorial time But if percase	X
Thou think'st the frame of fire and earth the air	W
The dew of water can in such wise meet	F2
As not by mingling to resign their nature	B
From them for thee no world can be create	F2
No thing of breath no stock or stalk of tree	M
In the wild congress of this varied heap	Z
Each thing its proper nature will display	Q3
And air will palpably be seen mixed up	O3
With earth together unquenched heat with water	B
But primal germs in bringing things to birth	D3
Must have a latent unseen quality	M
Lest some outstanding alien element	F2
Confuse and minish in the thing create	F2
Its proper being	D2
But these men begin	L2
From heaven and from its fire	B

Lucretius

Book I - Part 06 - Confutation Of Other Philosophers Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

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