Book V - Part 02 - Against Teleological Concept Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFGFHEIFJKLMFNOM PQFRFLFFFSFJTGFUFVWL FFFXXYZN A2B2MC2D2E2F2G2MFLH2 FI2FYJ2K2L2M2N2FAJFF O2P2LL SQ2LR2FFFLLFS2ND2T2L FU2V2FSFFD2W2X2JFJY2 FLZ2R2W2FN2EFA3C2C2B 3C2FC3JD3C2C2G2R2FW2 E3F3YK2JBG3FLFG3FD2F B2W2FV2H3FC2M2M2M2I3 C2JFNFLM2LC2M2C2M2FG 3FLFM2D2M2LFFM2S2FFM 2M2FFM2M2| And walking now | A |
| In his own footprints I do follow through | B |
| His reasonings and with pronouncements teach | C |
| The covenant whereby all things are framed | D |
| How under that covenant they must abide | E |
| Nor ever prevail to abrogate the aeons' | F |
| Inexorable decrees how as we've found | G |
| In class of mortal objects o'er all else | F |
| The mind exists of earth born frame create | H |
| And impotent unscathed to abide | E |
| Across the mighty aeons and how come | I |
| In sleep those idol apparitions | F |
| That so befool intelligence when we | J |
| Do seem to view a man whom life has left | K |
| Thus far we've gone the order of my plan | L |
| Hath brought me now unto the point where I | M |
| Must make report how too the universe | F |
| Consists of mortal body born in time | N |
| And in what modes that congregated stuff | O |
| Established itself as earth and sky | M |
| Ocean and stars and sun and ball of moon | P |
| And then what living creatures rose from out | Q |
| The old telluric places and what ones | F |
| Were never born at all and in what mode | R |
| The human race began to name its things | F |
| And use the varied speech from man to man | L |
| And in what modes hath bosomed in their breasts | F |
| That awe of gods which halloweth in all lands | F |
| Fanes altars groves lakes idols of the gods | F |
| Also I shall untangle by what power | S |
| The steersman Nature guides the sun's courses | F |
| And the meanderings of the moon lest we | J |
| Percase should fancy that of own free will | T |
| They circle their perennial courses round | G |
| Timing their motions for increase of crops | F |
| And living creatures or lest we should think | U |
| They roll along by any plan of gods | F |
| For even those men who have learned full well | V |
| That godheads lead a long life free of care | W |
| If yet meanwhile they wonder by what plan | L |
| Things can go on and chiefly yon high things | F |
| Observed o'erhead on the ethereal coasts | F |
| Again are hurried back unto the fears | F |
| Of old religion and adopt again | X |
| Harsh masters deemed almighty wretched men | X |
| Unwitting what can be and what cannot | Y |
| And by what law to each its scope prescribed | Z |
| Its boundary stone that clings so deep in Time | N |
| - | |
| But for the rest lest we delay thee here | A2 |
| Longer by empty promises behold | B2 |
| Before all else the seas the lands the sky | M |
| O Memmius their threefold nature lo | C2 |
| Their bodies three three aspects so unlike | D2 |
| Three frames so vast a single day shall give | E2 |
| Unto annihilation Then shall crash | F2 |
| That massive form and fabric of the world | G2 |
| Sustained so many aeons Nor do I | M |
| Fail to perceive how strange and marvellous | F |
| This fact must strike the intellect of man | L |
| Annihilation of the sky and earth | H2 |
| That is to be and with what toil of words | F |
| 'Tis mine to prove the same as happens oft | I2 |
| When once ye offer to man's listening ears | F |
| Something before unheard of but may not | Y |
| Subject it to the view of eyes for him | J2 |
| Nor put it into hand the sight and touch | K2 |
| Whereby the opened highways of belief | L2 |
| Lead most directly into human breast | M2 |
| And regions of intelligence But yet | N2 |
| I will speak out The fact itself perchance | F |
| Will force belief in these my words and thou | A |
| Mayst see in little time tremendously | J |
| With risen commotions of the lands all things | F |
| Quaking to pieces which afar from us | F |
| May she the steersman Nature guide and may | O2 |
| Reason O rather than the fact itself | P2 |
| Persuade us that all things can be o'erthrown | L |
| And sink with awful sounding breakage down | L |
| - | |
| But ere on this I take a step to utter | S |
| Oracles holier and soundlier based | Q2 |
| Than ever the Pythian pronounced for men | L |
| From out the tripod and the Delphian laurel | R2 |
| I will unfold for thee with learned words | F |
| Many a consolation lest perchance | F |
| Still bridled by religion thou suppose | F |
| Lands sun and sky sea constellations moon | L |
| Must dure forever as of frame divine | L |
| And so conclude that it is just that those | F |
| After the manner of the Giants should all | S2 |
| Pay the huge penalties for monstrous crime | N |
| Who by their reasonings do overshake | D2 |
| The ramparts of the universe and wish | T2 |
| There to put out the splendid sun of heaven | L |
| Branding with mortal talk immortal things | F |
| Though these same things are even so far removed | U2 |
| From any touch of deity and seem | V2 |
| So far unworthy of numbering with the gods | F |
| That well they may be thought to furnish rather | S |
| A goodly instance of the sort of things | F |
| That lack the living motion living sense | F |
| For sure 'tis quite beside the mark to think | D2 |
| That judgment and the nature of the mind | W2 |
| In any kind of body can exist | X2 |
| Just as in ether can't exist a tree | J |
| Nor clouds in the salt sea nor in the fields | F |
| Can fishes live nor blood in timber be | J |
| Nor sap in boulders fixed and arranged | Y2 |
| Where everything may grow and have its place | F |
| Thus nature of mind cannot arise alone | L |
| Without the body nor have its being far | Z2 |
| From thews and blood Yet if 'twere possible | R2 |
| Much rather might this very power of mind | W2 |
| Be in the head the shoulders or the heels | F |
| And born in any part soever yet | N2 |
| In the same man in the same vessel abide | E |
| But since within this body even of ours | F |
| Stands fixed and appears arranged sure | A3 |
| Where soul and mind can each exist and grow | C2 |
| Deny we must the more that they can dure | C2 |
| Outside the body and the breathing form | B3 |
| In rotting clods of earth in the sun's fire | C2 |
| In water or in ether's skiey coasts | F |
| Therefore these things no whit are furnished | C3 |
| With sense divine since never can they be | J |
| With life force quickened | D3 |
| Likewise thou canst ne'er | C2 |
| Believe the sacred seats of gods are here | C2 |
| In any regions of this mundane world | G2 |
| Indeed the nature of the gods so subtle | R2 |
| So far removed from these our senses scarce | F |
| Is seen even by intelligence of mind | W2 |
| And since they've ever eluded touch and thrust | E3 |
| Of human hands they cannot reach to grasp | F3 |
| Aught tangible to us For what may not | Y |
| Itself be touched in turn can never touch | K2 |
| Wherefore besides also their seats must be | J |
| Unlike these seats of ours even subtle too | B |
| As meet for subtle essence as I'll prove | G3 |
| Hereafter unto thee with large discourse | F |
| Further to say that for the sake of men | L |
| They willed to prepare this world's magnificence | F |
| And that 'tis therefore duty and behoof | G3 |
| To praise the work of gods as worthy praise | F |
| And that 'tis sacrilege for men to shake | D2 |
| Ever by any force from out their seats | F |
| What hath been stablished by the Forethought old | B2 |
| To everlasting for races of mankind | W2 |
| And that 'tis sacrilege to assault by words | F |
| And overtopple all from base to beam | V2 |
| Memmius such notions to concoct and pile | H3 |
| Is verily to dote Our gratefulness | F |
| O what emoluments could it confer | C2 |
| Upon Immortals and upon the Blessed | M2 |
| That they should take a step to manage aught | M2 |
| For sake of us Or what new factor could | M2 |
| After so long a time inveigle them | I3 |
| The hitherto reposeful to desire | C2 |
| To change their former life For rather he | J |
| Whom old things chafe seems likely to rejoice | F |
| At new but one that in fore passed time | N |
| Hath chanced upon no ill through goodly years | F |
| O what could ever enkindle in such an one | L |
| Passion for strange experiment Or what | M2 |
| The evil for us if we had ne'er been born | L |
| As though forsooth in darkling realms and woe | C2 |
| Our life were lying till should dawn at last | M2 |
| The day spring of creation Whosoever | C2 |
| Hath been begotten wills perforce to stay | M2 |
| In life so long as fond delight detains | F |
| But whoso ne'er hath tasted love of life | G3 |
| And ne'er was in the count of living things | F |
| What hurts it him that he was never born | L |
| Whence further first was planted in the gods | F |
| The archetype for gendering the world | M2 |
| And the fore notion of what man is like | D2 |
| So that they knew and pre conceived with mind | M2 |
| Just what they wished to make Or how were known | L |
| Ever the energies of primal germs | F |
| And what those germs by interchange of place | F |
| Could thus produce if nature's self had not | M2 |
| Given example for creating all | S2 |
| For in such wise primordials of things | F |
| Many in many modes astir by blows | F |
| From immemorial aeons in motion too | M2 |
| By their own weights have evermore been wont | M2 |
| To be so borne along and in all modes | F |
| To meet together and to try all sorts | F |
| Which by combining one with other they | M2 |
| Are powerful to create | M2 |
Lucretius
(1)
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