Page:The Bible of Nature, and Substance of Virtue.djvu/41

Our life must once have end, in vain we fly
From following fate; e'en now, e'en now we die.
He that says, nothing can be known, o'erthrows
His own opinion, for he nothing knows,
So knows not that: What need of long dispute,
These maxims kill themselves, themselves confute.
Besides, that seas, that rivers waste and die,
And still increase by constant new supply,
What need of proofs? This streams themselves do show
And in soft murmurs babble as they flow.
But lest the mass of waters prove too great,
The sum drinks some, to quench his natural heat;
And some the winds brush off: with wanton play
They dip their wings, and bear some parts away:
Some passes through the earth, diffus'd all o'er,
And leaves its salt behind in every pore;
For all returns through narrow channels spread,
And joins where'er the fountain shews her head;
And thence sweet streams in fair meanders play,
And through the valleys cut their liquid way;
And herbs, and flowers on every side bestow,
The fields all smile with flowers where'er they flow.
But more, the air through all the mighty frame
Is chang'd each hour, we breathe not twice the same:
Because as all things waste, the parts must fly
To the vast sea of air; they mount on high,
And softly wander in the lower sky.
Now did not this the wasting thing repair,
All had been long ago dissolv'd, all air.
Well, then, since all things waste, their vital chain
Dissolv'd, how can the frame of air remain?
It rises from, and makes up things again.
Besides, the sun, that constant spring of light,
Still cuts the heaven with streams of shining white,
And the decaying old, with new supplies,
For every portion of the beam that flies;
Nor should we see, but all lie blind in night,
Unless new streams flow'd from the spring of light.
Again, the strongest rocks, and towers do feel the rage
Of powerful time, e'en temples wast by age;