The Temple of Nature; or, the Origin of Society Part 8

[Footnote: _High on yon scroll_, l. 485. The famous sentence of Socrates "Know thyself," so celebrated by writers of antiquity, and said by them to have descended from Heaven, however wise it may be, seems to be rather of a selfish nature; and the author of it might have added "Know also other people." But the sacred maxims of the author of Christianity, "Do as you would be done by," and "Love your neighbour as yourself," include all our duties of benevolence and morality; and, if sincerely obeyed by all nations, would a thousandfold multiply the present happiness of mankind.]

"Unbreathing wonder hush'd the adoring throng, Froze the broad eye, and chain'd the silent tongue; Mute was the wail of Want, and Misery's cry, And grateful Pity wiped her lucid eye; Peace with sweet voice the Seraph-form address'd, And Virtue clasp'd him to her throbbing breast."

END OF CANTO III.

ORIGIN OF SOCIETY.

CANTO IV.

OF GOOD AND EVIL.

CONTENTS.

I. Few affected by Sympathy 1. Cruelty of War 11. Of brute animals, Wolf, Eagle, Lamb, Dove, Owl, Nightingale 17. Of insects, Oestrus, Ichneumon, Libellula 29. Wars of Vegetables 41. Of fish, the Shark, Crocodile, Whale 55. The World a Slaughter-house 66. Pains from Defect and from Excess of Stimulus 71. Ebriety and Superst.i.tion 77. Mania 89.

a.s.sociation 93. Avarice, Imposture, Ambition, Envy, Jealousy 97.

Floods, Volcanoes, Earthquakes, Famine 109. Pestilence 117. Pains from Sympathy 123. II. Good outbalances Evil 135. Life combines inanimate Matter, and produces happiness by Irritation 145. As in viewing a Landscape 159. In hearing Music 171. By Sensation or Fancy in Dreams 183. The Patriot and the Nun 197. Howard, Moira, Burdett 205. By Volition 223. Newton, Herschel 233. Archimedes, Savery 241. Isis, Arkwright 253. Letters and Printing 265. Freedom of the Press 273. By a.s.sociation 291. Ideas of Contiguity, Resemblance, and of Cause and Effect 299. Antinous 319. Cecilia 329. III. Life soon ceases, Births and Deaths alternate 337. Acorns, Poppy-seeds, Aphises, Snails, Worms, Tadpoles, Herrings innumerable 347. So Mankind 369. All Nature teems with Life 375. Dead Organic Matter soon revives 383. Death is but a change of Form 393. Exclamation of St. Paul 403. Happiness of the World increases 405. The Phoenix 411. System of Pythagoras 417. Rocks and Mountains produced by Organic Life 429. Are Monuments of past Felicity 447. Munificence of the Deity 455. IV. Procession of Virgins 469. Hymn to Heaven 481. Of Chaos 489. Of Celestial Love 499. Offering of Urania 517-524.

CANTO IV.

OF GOOD AND EVIL.

I. "HOW FEW," the MUSE in plaintive accents cries, And mingles with her words pathetic sighs.-- "How few, alas! in Nature's wide domains The sacred charm of SYMPATHY restrains!

Uncheck'd desires from appet.i.te commence, And pure reflection yields to selfish sense!

--Blest is the Sage, who learn'd in Nature's laws With nice distinction marks effect and cause; Who views the insatiate Grave with eye sedate, Nor fears thy voice, inexorable Fate! 10

[Footnote: _Blest is the Sage_, l. 7.

Felix, qui potuit rerum cognoscere causas; Quique metus omnes, et inexorabile fatum, Subjecit pedibus, strepitumque Acherontis avari.

VIRG. Georg. II. 490.]

"WHEN War, the Demon, lifts his banner high, And loud artillery rends the affrighted sky; Swords clash with swords, on horses horses rush, Man tramples man, and nations nations crush; Death his vast sithe with sweep enormous wields, And shuddering Pity quits the sanguine fields.

"The wolf, escorted by his milk-drawn dam, Unknown to mercy, tears the guiltless lamb; The towering eagle, darting from above, Unfeeling rends the inoffensive dove; 20 The lamb and dove on living nature feed, Crop the young herb, or crush the embryon seed.

Nor spares the loud owl in her dusky flight, Smit with sweet notes, the minstrel of the night; Nor spares, enamour'd of his radiant form, The hungry nightingale the glowing worm; Who with bright lamp alarms the midnight hour, Climbs the green stem, and slays the sleeping flower.

[Footnote: _The towering eagle_, l. 19.

Torva leaena lupum sequitur, lupus ipse capellam, Florentem cytisum sequitur lasciva capella.

VIRG.]

"Fell Oestrus buries in her rapid course Her countless brood in stag, or bull, or horse; 30 Whose hungry larva eats its living way, Hatch'd by the warmth, and issues into day.

The wing'd Ichneumon for her embryon young Gores with sharp horn the caterpillar throng.

The cruel larva mines its silky course, And tears the vitals of its fostering nurse.

While fierce Libellula with jaws of steel Ingulfs an insect-province at a meal; Contending bee-swarms rise on rustling wings, And slay their thousands with envenom'd stings. 40

[Footnote: _Fell Oestrus buries_, l. 29. The gadfly, bot-fly, or sheep-fly: the larva lives in the bodies of cattle throughout the whole winter; it is extracted from their backs by an African bird called Buphaga. Adhering to the a.n.u.s it artfully introduces itself into the intestines of horses, and becomes so numerous in their stomachs, as sometimes to destroy them; it climbs into the nostrils of sheep and calves, and producing a nest of young in a transparent hydatide in the frontal sinus, occasions the vertigo or turn of those animals. In Lapland it so attacks the rein deer that the natives annually travel with the herds from the woods to the mountains. Lin. Syst. Nat.]

[Footnote: _The wing'd Ichneumon_, l. 33. Linneus describes seventy-seven species of the ichneumon fly, some of which have a sting as long and some twice as long as their bodies.

Many of them insert their eggs into various caterpillars, which when they are hatched seem for a time to prey on the reservoir of silk in the backs of those animals designed for their own use to spin a cord to support them, or a bag to contain them, while they change from their larva form to a b.u.t.terfly; as I have seen in above fifty cabbage-caterpillars. The ichneumon larva then makes its way out of the caterpillar, and spins itself a small coc.o.o.n like a silk worm; these coc.o.o.ns are about the size of a small pin's head, and I have seen about ten of them on each cabbage caterpillar, which soon dies after their exclusion.

Other species of ichneumon insert their eggs into the aphis, and into the larva of the aphidivorous fly: others into the bedeguar of rose trees, and the gall-nuts of oaks; whence those excrescences seem to be produced, as well as the hydatides in the frontal sinus of sheep and calves by the stimulus of the larvae deposited in them.]

[Footnote: _While fierce Libellula_, l. 37. The Libellula or Dragon-fly is said to be a most voracious animal; Linneus says in their perfect state they are the hawks to naked winged flies; in their larva state they run beneath the water, and are the cruel crocodiles of aquatic insects. Syst.

Nat.]

[Footnote: _Contending bee-swarms_, l. 39. Stronger bee-swarms frequently attack weak hives, and in two or three days destroy them and carry away their honey; this I once prevented by removing the attacked hive after the first day's battle to a distinct part of the garden. See Phytologia, Sect. XIV. 3. 7.]

"Yes! smiling Flora drives her armed car Through the thick ranks of vegetable war; Herb, shrub, and tree, with strong emotions rise For light and air, and battle in the skies; Whose roots diverging with opposing toil Contend below for moisture and for soil; Round the tall Elm the flattering Ivies bend, And strangle, as they clasp, their struggling friend; Envenom'd dews from Mancinella flow, And scald with caustic touch the tribes below; 50 Dense shadowy leaves on stems aspiring borne With blight and mildew thin the realms of corn; And insect hordes with restless tooth devour The unfolded bud, and pierce the ravell'd flower.

"In ocean's pearly haunts, the waves beneath Sits the grim monarch of insatiate Death; The shark rapacious with descending blow Darts on the scaly brood, that swims below; The crawling crocodiles, beneath that move, Arrest with rising jaw the tribes above; 60 With monstrous gape sepulchral whales devour Shoals at a gulp, a million in an hour.

--Air, earth, and ocean, to astonish'd day One scene of blood, one mighty tomb display!

From Hunger's arm the shafts of Death are hurl'd, And one great Slaughter-house the warring world!

[Footnote: _The shark rapacious_, l. 57. The shark has three rows of sharp teeth within each other, which he can bend downwards internally to admit larger prey, and raise to prevent its return; his snout hangs so far over his mouth, that he is necessitated to turn upon his back, when he takes fish that swim over him, and hence seems peculiarly formed to catch those that swim under him.]

[Footnote: _The crawling crocodiles_, l. 59. As this animal lives chiefly at the bottom of the rivers, which he frequents, he has the power of opening the upper jaw as well as the under one, and thus with greater facility catches the fish or water-fowl which swim over him.]

[Footnote: _One great slaughter-house_, l. 66. As vegetables are an inferior order of animals fixed to the soil; and as the locomotive animals prey upon them, or upon each other; the world may indeed be said to be one great slaughter-house.

As the digested food of vegetables consists princ.i.p.ally of sugar, and from this is produced again their mucilage, starch, and oil, and since animals are sustained by these vegetable productions, it would seem that the sugar-making process carried on in vegetable vessels was the great source of life to all organized beings. And that if our improved chemistry should ever discover the art of making sugar from fossile or aerial matter without the a.s.sistance of vegetation, food for animals would then become as plentiful as water, and they might live upon the earth without preying on each other, as thick as blades of gra.s.s, with no restraint to their numbers but the want of local room.

It would seem that roots fixed in the earth and leaves innumerable waving in the air were necessary for the decomposition of water and air, and the conversion of them into saccharine matter, which would have been not only c.u.mberous but totally incompatible with the locomotion of animal bodies. For how could a man or quadruped have carried on his head or back a forest of leaves, or have had long branching lacteal or absorbent vessels terminating in the earth? Animals therefore subsist on vegetables; that is they take the matter so prepared, and have organs to prepare it further for the purposes of higher animation and greater sensibility.]

"THE brow of Man erect, with thought elate, Ducks to the mandate of resistless fate; Nor Love retains him, nor can Virtue save Her sages, saints, or heroes from the grave. 70 While cold and hunger by defect oppress, Repletion, heat, and labour by excess, The whip, the sting, the spur, the fiery brand, And, cursed Slavery! thy iron hand; And led by Luxury Disease's trains, Load human life with unextinguish'd pains.

[Footnote: _While cold and hunger_, l. 71. Those parts of our system, which are in health excited into perpetual action, give us pain, when they are not excited into action: thus when the hands are for a time immersed in snow, an inaction of the cutaneous capillaries is induced, as is seen from the paleness of the skin, which is attended with the pain of coldness. So the pain of hunger is probably produced by the inaction of the muscular fibres of the stomach from the want of the stimulus of food.

Thus those, who have used much voluntary exertion in their early years, and have continued to do so, till the decline of life commences, if they then lay aside their employment, whether that of a minister of state, a general of an army, or a merchant, or manufacturer; they cease to have their faculties excited into their usual activity, and become unhappy, I suppose from the too great acc.u.mulation of the sensorial power of volition; which wants the accustomed stimulus or motive to cause its expenditure.]

"Here laughs Ebriety more fell than arms, And thins the nations with her fatal charms, With Gout, and Hydrops groaning in her train, And cold Debility, and grinning Pain, 80 With harlot's smiles deluded man salutes, Revenging all his cruelties to brutes!

There the curst spells of Superst.i.tion blind, And fix her fetters on the tortured mind; She bids in dreams tormenting shapes appear, With shrieks that shock Imagination's ear, E'en o'er the grave a deeper shadow flings, And maddening Conscience darts a thousand stings.

[Footnote: _Here laughs Ebriety_, l. 77.

Saevior armis Luxuria incubuit, victumque ulciscitur orbem.

HORAC.]

[Footnote: _E'en o'er the grave_, l. 87. Many theatric preachers among the Methodists successfully inculcate the fear of death and of h.e.l.l, and live luxuriously on the folly of their hearers: those who suffer under this insanity, are generally most innocent and harmless people, who are then liable to accuse themselves of the greatest imaginary crimes; and have so much intellectual cowardice, that they dare not reason about those things, which they are directed by their priests to believe. Where this intellectual cowardice is great, the voice of reason is ineffectual; but that of ridicule may save many from these mad-making doctors, as the farces of Mr. Foot; though it is too weak to cure those who are already hallucinated.]