Mortal, what hast thou of such grave concern
That thou indulgest in too sickly plaints?
Why this bemoaning and beweeping death?
For if thy life aforetime and behind
To thee was grateful, and not all thy good
Was heaped as in sieve to flow away
And perish unavailingly, why not,
Even like a banqueter, depart the hall,
Laden with life?
Every person tries to flee himself—yet despite ourselves, we remain attached to this self which we hate.
LucretiusAir, I should explain, becomes wind when it is agitated.
LucretiusMatter's basic elements are solid,
Completely so, and that they fly through time
Invincible, indestructible for ever.
Trees don't live in the sky, and clouds don't swim
In the salt seas, and fish don't leap in wheatfields,
Blood isn't found in wood, nor sap in rocks.
By fixed arrangement, all that live and grows
Submits to limit and restrictions.
You see that stones are worn away by time,
Rocks rot, and twoers topple, even the shrines
And images of the gods grow very tired,
Develop crack or wrinkles, their holy wills
Unable to extend their fated term,
To litigate against the Laws of Nature.
And don't we see the monuments of men
Collapse, as if to ask us, "Are not we
As frail as those whom we commemorate?"?
Boulders come plunging down from the mountain heights,
Poor weaklings with no power to resist
The thrust that says to them, Your time has come!
But they would be rooted in steadfastness
Had they endured from time beyond all time,
As far back as infinity. Look about you!
Whatever it is that holds in its embrace
All earth, if it projects, as some men say,
All things out of itself, and takes them back
When they have perished, must itself consist
Of mortal elements. The parts must add
Up to the sum. Whatever gives away
Must lose in the procedure, and gain again
Whenever it takes back.
There is nothing that exists so great or marvelous that over time mankind does not admire it less and less.
LucretiusThough you outlive as many generations as you will,
Nevertheless, Eternal Death is waiting for you still.
It is no shorter, that eternity that lies in store
For the man who with the setting sun today will rise no more,
Than for the man whose sun has set months, even years, before.
Il faut avant tout chasser et détruire cette crainte de l'Achéron ( le fleuve des enfers ) qui, pénétrant jusqu'au fond de notre être, empoisonne la vie humaine, colore toute chose de la noirceur de la mort et ne laisse subsister aucun plaisir limpide et pur.
LucretiusWe, peopling the void air, make gods to whom we impute the ills we ought to bear.
LucretiusMots clés poetry poem meaning superstition fables myths legends
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