The bent ploughshare of iron insensibly Grows smaller in the fields; and we behold The paving stones of roads worn down at length By the footsteps of the people. Then again The brazen statues at the city gates Show right hands wearing thinner by the touch Of those who greet them ever as they pass by. Thus we perceive that all such things grow less Because they have been worn down: and yet what atoms Are leaving them each moment, that the jealous Nature of vision has quite shut us out From seeing. Finally whatever time And nature gradually add to things, Obliging them to grow in due proportion, No effort of our eyesight can behold. So too whenever things grow old by age Or through corruption, and wherever rocks That overhang the sea are gnawed away By the corroding brine, you cannot discern What they are losing at any single moment. Thus nature operates by unseen atoms. BOOK II, lines 991-1174 Moreover we are sprung, all we that live, From heavenly seed: there is, for all, that same One father[C]; from whom when the bounteous Earth, Our mother, has drunk in the liquid drops Of moisture, then by him impregnated She bears bright crops and glad trees and the race Of men, bears every species of wild beast, Furnishing food with which all feed their bodies, And lead a pleasant life, and propagate Their offspring. Wherefore justly she has won The name of mother. Also that which once Came from the earth, sinks back into the earth, And what was sent down from the coasts of aether, Returning thither, is received once more Into the mansions of the sky. So death Does not demolish things in such a way As to destroy the particles of matter, But only dissipates their union, Then recombines one element with another, And so brings it to pass that all things change Their shapes, alter their colours, and receive Sensations, then in a moment yield them up. Thus you may learn how greatly it signifies Both with what others and in what positions The same primordial atoms are held bound; Also what motions they are mutually Imparting and receiving: and thus too You need no more suppose that what we see Hovering upon the surfaces of things, Or now being born, then suddenly perishing,[D] Can be inherent qualities in atoms That are eternal. Nay, in my verses even It is of moment with what other letters And in what order each one has been placed. If not all, yet by far the greater part Are similar letters: but as their position Varies, so do the words sound different. Thus too with actual things, whenever change Takes place in the collisions motions order Shape and position of their material atoms, Then also must the things themselves be changed.