In these affairs it much behooveth thee To look both wide and deep, and far abroad To peer to every quarter, that thou mayst Remember how boundless is the Sum-of-Things, And mark how infinitely small a part Of the whole Sum is this one sky of ours-O not so large a part as is one man Of the whole earth. And plainly if thou viewest This cosmic fact, placing it square in front, And plainly understandest, thou wilt leave Wondering at many things. For who of us Wondereth if some one gets into his joints A fever, gathering head with fiery heat, Or any other dolorous disease Along his members? For anon the foot Grows blue and bulbous; often the sharp twinge Seizes the teeth, attacks the very eyes;Out-breaks the sacred fire, and, crawling on Over the body, burneth every part It seizeth on, and works its hideous way Along the frame. No marvel this, since, lo, Of things innumerable be seeds enough, And this our earth and sky do bring to us Enough of bane from whence can grow the strength Of maladies uncounted. Thuswise, then, We must suppose to all the sky and earth Are ever supplied from out the infinite All things, O all in stores enough whereby The shaken earth can of a sudden move, And fierce typhoons can over sea and lands Go tearing on, and Aetna's fires o'erflow, And heaven become a flame-burst. For that, too, Happens at times, and the celestial vaults Glow into fire, and rainy tempests rise In heavier congregation, when, percase, The seeds of water have foregathered thus From out the infinite. "Aye, but passing huge The fiery turmoil of that conflagration!"So sayst thou; well, huge many a river seems To him that erstwhile ne'er a larger saw;Thus, huge seems tree or man; and everything Which mortal sees the biggest of each class, That he imagines to be "huge"; though yet All these, with sky and land and sea to boot, Are all as nothing to the sum entire Of the all-Sum.
But now I will unfold At last how yonder suddenly angered flame Out-blows abroad from vasty furnaces Aetnaean. First, the mountain's nature is All under-hollow, propped about, about With caverns of basaltic piers. And, lo, In all its grottos be there wind and air-For wind is made when air hath been uproused By violent agitation. When this air Is heated through and through, and, raging round, Hath made the earth and all the rocks it touches Horribly hot, and hath struck off from them Fierce fire of swiftest flame, it lifts itself And hurtles thus straight upwards through its throat Into high heav'n, and thus bears on afar Its burning blasts and scattereth afar Its ashes, and rolls a smoke of pitchy murk And heaveth the while boulders of wondrous weight-Leaving no doubt in thee that 'tis the air's Tumultuous power. Besides, in mighty part, The sea there at the roots of that same mount Breaks its old billows and sucks back its surf.
And grottos from the sea pass in below Even to the bottom of the mountain's throat.
Herethrough thou must admit there go...
. . . . . .
And the conditions force [the water and air]
Deeply to penetrate from the open sea, And to out-blow abroad, and to up-bear Thereby the flame, and to up-cast from deeps The boulders, and to rear the clouds of sand.
For at the top be "bowls," as people there Are wont to name what we at Rome do call The throats and mouths.
There be, besides, some thing Of which 'tis not enough one only cause To state- but rather several, whereof one Will be the true: lo, if thou shouldst espy Lying afar some fellow's lifeless corse, 'Twere meet to name all causes of a death, That cause of his death might thereby be named:
For prove thou mayst he perished not by steel, By cold, nor even by poison nor disease, Yet somewhat of this sort hath come to him We know- And thus we have to say the same In divers cases.
Toward the summer, Nile Waxeth and overfloweth the champaign, Unique in all the landscape, river sole Of the Aegyptians. In mid-season heats Often and oft he waters Aegypt o'er, Either because in summer against his mouths Come those northwinds which at that time of year Men name the Etesian blasts, and, blowing thus Upstream, retard, and, forcing back his waves, Fill him o'erfull and force his flow to stop.
For out of doubt these blasts which driven be From icy constellations of the pole Are borne straight up the river. Comes that river From forth the sultry places down the south, Rising far up in midmost realm of day, Among black generations of strong men With sun-baked skins. 'Tis possible, besides, That a big bulk of piled sand may bar His mouths against his onward waves, when sea, Wild in the winds, tumbles the sand to inland;Whereby the river's outlet were less free, Likewise less headlong his descending floods.
It may be, too, that in this season rains Are more abundant at its fountain head, Because the Etesian blasts of those northwinds Then urge all clouds into those inland parts.
And, soothly, when they're thus foregathered there, Urged yonder into midmost realm of day, Then, crowded against the lofty mountain sides, They're massed and powerfully pressed. Again, Perchance, his waters wax, O far away, Among the Aethiopians' lofty mountains, When the all-beholding sun with thawing beams Drives the white snows to flow into the vales.
Now come; and unto thee I will unfold, As to the Birdless spots and Birdless tarns, What sort of nature they are furnished with.
First, as to name of "birdless,"- that derives From very fact, because they noxious be Unto all birds. For when above those spots In horizontal flight the birds have come, Forgetting to oar with wings, they furl their sails, And, with down-drooping of their delicate necks, Fall headlong into earth, if haply such The nature of the spots, or into water, If haply spreads thereunder Birdless tarn.