The Temple of Nature; or, the Origin of Society Part 10

Addison adds, that these must occasion surprise as well as delight; Spectator, Vol. I. No. LXII. See Note on Canto III.

l. 145. and Additional Note, VII. 3. Perhaps wit in the extended use of the word may mean to express all kinds of fine writing, as the word Taste is applied to all agreeable visible objects, and thus wit may mean descriptive sublimity, beauty, the pathetic, or ridiculous, but when used in the confined sense, as by Mr. Locke and Mr. Addison as above, it may probably be better defined a combination of ideas with agreeable novelty, as this may be effected by opposition as well as by resemblance.]

"Last, at thy potent nod, Effect and Cause Walk hand in hand accordant to thy laws; Rise at Volition's call, in groups combined, Amuse, delight, instruct, and serve Mankind; Bid raised in air the ponderous structure stand, Or pour obedient rivers through the land; With cars unnumber'd crowd the living streets, Or people oceans with triumphant fleets.

"Thy magic touch imagined forms supplies From colour'd light, the language of the eyes; 320 On Memory's page departed hours inscribes, Sweet scenes of youth, and Pleasure's vanish'd tribes.

By thee ANTINOUS leads the dance sublime On wavy step, and moves in measured time; Charm'd round the Youth successive Graces throng, And Ease conducts him, as he moves along; Unbreathing crowds the floating form admire, And Vestal bosoms feel forbidden fire.

"When rapp'd CECILIA breathes her matin vow, And lifts to Heaven her fair adoring brow; 330 From her sweet lips, and rising bosom part Impa.s.sion'd notes, that thrill the melting heart; Tuned by thy hand the dulcet harp she rings, And sounds responsive echo from the strings; Bright scenes of bliss in trains suggested move, And charm the world with melody and love.

III. "SOON the fair forms with vital being bless'd, Time's feeble children, lose the boon possess'd; The goaded fibre ceases to obey, And sense deserts the uncontractile clay; 340 While births unnumber'd, ere the parents die, The hourly waste of lovely life supply; And thus, alternating with death, fulfil The silent mandates of the Almighty Will; Whose hand unseen the works of nature dooms By laws unknown--WHO GIVES, AND WHO RESUMES.

[Footnote: _The goaded fibre_, l. 339. Old age consists in the inapt.i.tude to motion from the inirritability of the system, and the consequent want of fibrous contraction; see Additional Note VII.]

"Each pregnant Oak ten thousand acorns forms Profusely scatter'd by autumnal storms; Ten thousand seeds each pregnant poppy sheds Profusely scatter'd from its waving heads; 350 The countless Aphides, prolific tribe, With greedy trunks the honey'd sap imbibe; Swarm on each leaf with eggs or embryons big, And pendent nations tenant every twig.

Amorous with double s.e.x, the snail and worm, Scoop'd in the soil, their cradling caverns form; Heap their white eggs, secure from frost and floods, And crowd their nurseries with uncounted broods.

Ere yet with wavy tail the tadpole swims, Breathes with new lungs, or tries his nascent limbs; 360 Her countless shoals the amphibious frog forsakes, And living islands float upon the lakes.

The migrant herring steers her myriad bands From seas of ice to visit warmer strands; Unfathom'd depths and climes unknown explores, And covers with her sp.a.w.n unmeasured sh.o.r.es.

--All these, increasing by successive birth, Would each o'erpeople ocean, air, and earth.

[Footnote: _Ten thousand seeds_, l. 349. The fertility of plants in respect to seeds is often remarkable; from one root in one summer the seeds of zea, maize, amount to 2000; of inula, elecampane, to 3000; of helianthus, sunflower, to 4000; of papaver, poppy, 32000; of nicotiana, tobacco, to 40320; to this must be added the perennial roots, and the buds. Buds, which are so many herbs, in one tree, the trunk of which does not exceed a span in thickness, frequently amount to 10000; Lin. Phil. Bot. p. 86.]

[Footnote: _The countless Aphides_, l. 351. The aphises, pucerons, or vine-fretters, are hatched from an egg in the early spring, and are all called females, as they produce a living offspring about once in a fortnight to the ninth generation, which are also all of them females; then males are also produced, and by their intercourse the females become oviparous, and deposite their eggs on the branches, or in the bark to be hatched in the ensuing spring.

This double mode of reproduction, so exactly resembling the buds and seeds of trees, accounts for the wonderful increase of this insect, which, according to Dr. Richardson, consists of ten generations, and of fifty at an average in each generation; so that the sum of fifty multiplied by fifty, and that product again multiplied by fifty nine times, would give the product of one egg only in countless millions; to which must be added the innumerable eggs laid by the tenth generation for the renovation of their progeny in the ensuing spring.]

[Footnote: _The honey'd sap_, l. 352. The aphis punctures with its fine proboscis the sap-vessels of vegetables without any visible wound, and thus drinks the sap-juice, or vegetable chyle, as it ascends. Hence on the twigs of trees they stand with their heads downwards, as I have observed, to acquire this ascending sap-juice with greater facility. The honey-dew on the upper surface of leaves is evacuated by these insects, as they hang on the underside of the leaves above; when they take too much of this saccharine juice during the vernal or midsummer sap-flow of most vegetables; the black powder on leaves is also their excrement at other times. The vegetable world seems to have escaped total destruction from this insect by the number of flies, which in their larva state prey upon them; and by the ichneumon fly, which deposits its eggs in them. Some vegetables put forth stiff bristles with points round their young shoots, as the moss-rose, apparently to prevent the depredation of these insects, so injurious to them by robbing them of their chyle or nourishment.]

[Footnote: _The tadpole swims_, l. 359. The progress of a tadpole from a fish to a quadruped by his gradually putting forth his limbs, and at length leaving the water, and breathing the dry air, is a subject of great curiosity, as it resembles so much the incipient state of all other quadrupeds, and men, who are aquatic animals in the uterus, and become aerial ones at their birth.]

"So human progenies, if unrestrain'd, By climate friended, and by food sustain'd, 370 O'er seas and soils, prolific hordes! would spread Erelong, and deluge their terraqueous bed; But war, and pestilence, disease, and dearth, Sweep the superfluous myriads from the earth.

Thus while new forms reviving tribes acquire Each pa.s.sing moment, as the old expire; Like insects swarming in the noontide bower, Rise into being, and exist an hour; The births and deaths contend with equal strife, And every pore of Nature teems with Life; 380 Which buds or breathes from Indus to the Poles, And Earth's vast surface kindles, as it rolls!

[Footnote: _Which buds or breathes_, l. 381. Organic bodies, besides the carbon, hydrogen, azote, and the oxygen and heat, which are combined with them, require to be also immersed in loose heat and loose oxygen to preserve their mutable existence; and hence life only exists on or near the surface of the earth; see Botan. Garden, Vol. I. Canto IV. l. 419.

L'organisation, le sentiment, le movement spontane, la vie, n'existent qu'a la surface de la terre, et dans les lieux exposes a la lumiere. Traite de Chimie par M. Lavoisier, Tom.

I. p. 202.]

"HENCE when a Monarch or a mushroom dies, Awhile extinct the organic matter lies; But, as a few short hours or years revolve, Alchemic powers the changing ma.s.s dissolve; Born to new life unnumber'd insects pant, New buds surround the microscopic plant; Whose embryon senses, and unwearied frames, Feel finer goads, and blush with purer flames; 390 Renascent joys from irritation spring, Stretch the long root, or wave the aurelian wing.

[Footnote: _Born to new life_, l. 387. From the innumerable births of the larger insects, and the spontaneous productions of the microscopic ones, every part of organic matter from the recrements of dead vegetable or animal bodies, on or near the surface of the earth, becomes again presently reanimated; which by increasing the number and quant.i.ty of living organizations, though many of them exist but for a short time, adds to the sum total of terrestrial happiness.]

"When thus a squadron or an army yields, And festering carnage loads the waves or fields; When few from famines or from plagues survive, Or earthquakes swallow half a realm alive;-- While Nature sinks in Time's destructive storms, The wrecks of Death are but a change of forms; Emerging matter from the grave returns, Feels new desires, with new sensations burns; 400 With youth's first bloom a finer sense acquires, And Loves and Pleasures fan the rising fires.-- Thus sainted PAUL, 'O Death!' exulting cries, 'Where is thy sting? O Grave! thy victories?'

[Footnote: _Thus sainted Paul_, l. 403. The doctrine of St.

Paul teaches the resurrection of the body in an incorruptible and glorified state, with consciousness of its previous existence; he therefore justly exults over the sting of death, and the victory of the grave.]

"Immortal Happiness from realms deceased Wakes, as from sleep, unlessen'd or increased; Calls to the wise in accents loud and clear, Sooths with sweet tones the sympathetic ear; Informs and fires the revivescent clay, And lights the dawn of Life's returning day. 410

[Footnote: _And lights the dawn_, l. 410. The sum total of the happiness of organized nature is probably increased rather than diminished, when one large old animal dies, and is converted into many thousand young ones; which are produced or supported with their numerous progeny by the same organic matter. Linneus a.s.serts, that three of the flies, called musca vomitoria, will consume the body of a dead horse, as soon as a lion can; Syst. Nat.]

"So when Arabia's Bird, by age oppress'd, Consumes delighted on his spicy nest; A filial Phoenix from his ashes springs, Crown'd with a star, on renovated wings; Ascends exulting from his funeral flame, And soars and s.h.i.+nes, another and the same.

[Footnote: _So when Arabia's bird_, l. 411. The story of the Phoenix rising from its own ashes with a star upon its head seems to have been an hieroglyphic emblem of the destruction and resuscitation of all things; see Botan. Garden, Vol. I.

Canto IV. l. 389.]

"So erst the Sage with scientific truth In Grecian temples taught the attentive youth; With ceaseless change how restless atoms pa.s.s From life to life, a transmigrating ma.s.s; 420 How the same organs, which to day compose The poisonous henbane, or the fragrant rose, May with to morrow's sun new forms compile, Frown in the Hero, in the Beauty smile.

Whence drew the enlighten'd Sage the moral plan, That man should ever be the friend of man; Should eye with tenderness all living forms, His brother-emmets, and his sister-worms.

[Footnote: _So erst the Sage_, l. 417. It is probable, that the perpetual transmigration of matter from one body to another, of all vegetables and animals, during their lives, as well as after their deaths, was observed by Pythagoras; which he afterwards applied to the soul, or spirit of animation, and taught, that it pa.s.sed from one animal to another as a punishment for evil deeds, though without consciousness of its previous existence; and from this doctrine he inculcated a system of morality and benevolence, as all creatures thus became related to each other.]

"HEAR, O ye Sons of Time! your final doom, And read the characters, that mark your tomb: 430 The marble mountain, and the sparry steep, Were built by myriad nations of the deep,-- Age after age, who form'd their spiral sh.e.l.ls, Their sea-fan gardens and their coral cells; Till central fires with unextinguished sway Raised the primeval islands into day;-- The sand-fill'd strata stretch'd from pole to pole; Unmeasured beds of clay, and marl, and coal, Black ore of manganese, the zinky stone, And dusky steel on his magnetic throne, 440 In deep mora.s.s, or eminence superb, Rose from the wrecks of animal or herb; These from their elements by Life combined, Form'd by digestion, and in glands refined, Gave by their just excitement of the sense The Bliss of Being to the vital Ens.

[Footnote: _The marble mountain_, l. 431. From the increased knowledge in Geology during the present century, owing to the greater attention of philosophers to the situations of the different materials, which compose the strata of the earth, as well as to their chemical properties, it seems clearly to appear, that the nucleus of the globe beneath the ocean consisted of granite; and that on this the great beds of limestone were formed from the sh.e.l.ls of marine animals during the innumerable primeval ages of the world; and that whatever strata lie on these beds of limestone, or on the granite, where the limestone does not cover it, were formed after the elevation of islands and continents above the surface of the sea by the recrements of vegetables and of terrestrial animals; see on this subject Botanic Garden, Vol.

I. Additional Note XXIV.]

"Thus the tall mountains, that emboss the lands, Huge isles of rock, and continents of sands, Whose dim extent eludes the inquiring sight, ARE MIGHTY MONUMENTS OF PAST DELIGHT; 450 Shout round the globe, how Reproduction strives With vanquish'd Death,--and Happiness survives; How Life increasing peoples every clime, And young renascent Nature conquers Time; --And high in golden characters record The immense munificence of NATURE'S LORD!--

[Footnote: _Are mighty monuments_, l. 450. The reader is referred to a few pages on this subject in Phytologia, Sect.

XIX. 7. 1, where the felicity of organic life is considered more at large; but it is probable that the most certain way to estimate the happiness and misery of organic beings; as it depends on the actions of the organs of sense, which const.i.tute ideas; or of the muscular fibres which perform locomotion; would be to consider those actions, as they are produced or excited by the four sensorial powers of irritation, sensation, volition, and a.s.sociation. A small volume on this subject by some ingenious writer, might not only amuse, as an object of curiosity; but by showing the world the immediate sources of their pains and pleasures might teach the means to avoid the one, and to procure the other, and thus contribute both ways to increase the sum total of organic happiness.]

[Footnote: _How Life increasing_, l. 453. Not only the vast calcareous provinces, which form so great a part of the terraqueous globe, and also whatever rests upon them, as clay, marl, sand, and coal, were formed from the fluid elements of heat, oxygen, azote, and hydrogen along with carbon, phosphorus, and perhaps a few other substances, which the science of chemistry has not yet decomposed; and gave the pleasure of life to the animals and vegetables, which formed them; and thus const.i.tute monuments of the past happiness of those organized beings. But as those remains of former life are not again totally decomposed, or converted into their original elements, they supply more copious food to the succession of new animal or vegetable beings on their surface; which consists of materials convertible into nutriment with less labour or activity of the digestive powers; and hence the quant.i.ty or number of organized bodies, and their improvement in size, as well as their happiness, has been continually increasing, along with the solid parts of the globe; and will probably continue to increase, till the whole terraqueous sphere, and all that inhabit it shall dissolve by a general conflagration, and be again reduced to their elements.

Thus all the suns, and the planets, which circle round them, may again sink into one central chaos; and may again by explosions produce a new world; which in process of time may resemble the present one, and at length again undergo the same catastrophe! these great events may be the result of the immutable laws impressed on matter by the Great Cause of Causes, Parent of Parents, Ens Entium!]

"He gives and guides the sun's attractive force, And steers the planets in their silver course; With heat and light revives the golden day, And breathes his spirit on organic clay; 460 With hand unseen directs the general cause By firm immutable immortal laws."

Charm'd with her words the Muse astonish'd stands, The Nymphs enraptured clasp their velvet hands; Applausive thunder from the fane recoils, And holy echoes peal along the ailes; O'er NATURE'S shrine celestial l.u.s.tres glow, And lambent glories circle round her brow.

IV. Now sinks the golden sun,--the vesper song Demands the tribute of URANIA'S tongue; 470 Onward she steps, her fair a.s.sociates calls From leaf-wove avenues, and vaulted halls.

Fair virgin trains in bright procession move, Trail their long robes, and whiten all the grove; Pair after pair to Nature's temple sweep, Thread the broad arch, ascend the winding steep; Through brazen gates along susurrant ailes Stream round their G.o.dDESS the successive files; Curve above curve to golden seats retire, And star with beauty the refulgent quire. 480

AND first to HEAVEN the consecrated throng With chant alternate pour the adoring song, Swell the full hymn, now high, and now profound, With sweet responsive symphony of sound.

Seen through their wiry harps, below, above, Nods the fair brow, the twinkling fingers move; Soft-warbling flutes the ruby lip commands, And cymbals ring with high uplifted hands.

TO CHAOS next the notes melodious pa.s.s, How suns exploded from the kindling ma.s.s, 490 Waved o'er the vast inane their tresses bright, And charm'd young Nature's opening eyes with light.

Next from each sun how spheres reluctant burst, And second planets issued from the first.

And then to EARTH descends the moral strain, How isles, emerging from the sh.o.r.eless main, With sparkling streams and fruitful groves began, And form'd a Paradise for mortal man.

[Footnote: _To Chaos next_, l. 489.

Namque canebat uti magnum per inane coacta Semina terrarumque, animaeque, marisque fuissent; Et liquidi simul ignis; ut his exordia primis Omnia, et ipse tener mundi concreverit orbis.

VIRG. EC. VI. l. 31.]

Sublimer notes record CELESTIAL LOVE, And high rewards in brighter climes above; 500 How Virtue's beams with mental charm engage Youth's raptured eye, and warm the frost of age, Gild with soft l.u.s.tre Death's tremendous gloom, And light the dreary chambers of the tomb.

How fell Remorse shall strike with venom'd dart, Though mail'd in adamant, the guilty heart; Fierce furies drag to pains and realms unknown The blood-stain'd tyrant from his tottering throne.

By hands unseen are struck aerial wires, And Angel-tongues are heard amid the quires; 510 From aile to aile the trembling concord floats, And the wide roof returns the mingled notes, Through each fine nerve the keen vibrations dart, Pierce the charm'd ear, and thrill the echoing heart.--

MUTE the sweet voice, and still the quivering strings, Now Silence hovers on unmoving wings.-- --Slow to the altar fair URANIA bends Her graceful march, the sacred steps ascends, High in the midst with blazing censer stands, And scatters incense with illumined hands: 520 Thrice to the G.o.dDESS bows with solemn pause, With trembling awe the mystic veil withdraws, And, meekly kneeling on the gorgeous shrine, Lifts her ecstatic eyes to TRUTH DIVINE! 524