Page:Metamorphoses (Ovid, 1567).djvu/10

Howbeeit so farre foorth as things no whit impeachment are
To vertue and to godlynesse but furtherers of the same,
I trust wee may them saufly use without desert of blame.
And yet there are (and those not of the rude and vulgar sort,
But such as have of godlynesse and lerning good report)
That thinke the Poets tooke their first occasion of theis things
From holy writ as from the well from whence all wisdome springs.
What man is he but would suppose the author of this booke
The first foundation of his woorke from Moyses wryghtings tooke?
Not only in effect he dooth with Genesis agree,
But also in the order of creation, save that hee
Makes no distinction of the dayes. For what is else at all
That shapelesse, rude, and pestred heape which Chaos he dooth call,
Than even that universall masse of things which God did make
In one whole lump before that ech their proper place did take.
Of which the Byble saith, that in the first beginning God
Made heaven and earth: the earth was waste, and darkness yit abod
Uppon the deepe: which holy woordes declare unto us playne
That fyre, ayre, water, and the earth did undistinct remayne
In one grosse bodie at the first. ℂ "For God the father that
Made all things, framing out the world according to the plat,
Conceyved everlastingly in mynd, made first of all
Both heaven and earth uncorporall and such as could not fall
As objects under sense of sight: and also aire lykewyse,
And emptynesse: and for theis twaine apt termes he did devyse.
He called ayer darknesse: for the ayre by kynd is darke.
And emptynesse by name of depth full aptly he did marke:
For emptynesse is deepe and waste by nature. Overmore
He formed also bodylesse (as other things before)
The natures both of water and of spirit. And in fyne
The lyght: which beeing made to bee a patterne most divine
Whereby to forme the fixed starres and wandring planets seven,
With all the lyghts that afterward should beawtifie the heaven,
Was made by God both bodylesse and of so pure a kynd,
As that it could alonly bee perceyved by the mynd."
To thys effect are Philos words. And certainly this same
Is it that Poets in their worke confused Chaos name.
Not that Gods woorkes at any tyme were pact confusedly
Toogither: but bicause no place nor outward shape whereby
To shew them to the feeble sense of mans deceytfull syght
Was yit appointed unto things, untill that by his myght
And wondrous wisdome God in tyme set open to the eye
The things that he before all tyme had everlastingly
Decreed by his providence. But let us further see
How Ovids scantlings with the whole true patterne doo agree.
The first day by his mighty word (sayth Moyses) God made lyght,
The second day the firmament, which heaven or welkin hyght.
The third day he did part the earth from sea and made it drie,
Commaunding it to beare all kynd of frutes abundantly.

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