b SATURDAY LECTUKES. 



No sun \va^ lii^lucd up tlie world to view. 



No moon did yet her Ijlunted hours renew, 



Nor yet was earth suspended in the sky. 



Nor poised, did on her own foundation lie. 



Nor seas about the shores their arm~ had thrown 



But earth, and air, and water were in one. 



Thus air was void of light, and earth unstable. 



And water's dark abyss unnavigable. 



No certain form on any was impressed : 



All were confusion, and each disturb'd the rest. 



For hot and cold were in one body fix'd, 



And soft with hard, and light with heavy, mix'd 



Thus disembroird, they take their proper place ; 



The next of kin contiguously embrace ; 



And foes are sunder" d by a larger space. 



The force of fire ascended first on high, 



.\nd took its dwelling in the vaulted sky : 



Then air succeeds, in lightness next to fire, 



Whose atoms from unactivc earth retire."* 



As to the mode in which the various elements were 

 peopled, hear also Ovid : 



" Then, every void of nature to supply, 

 With fonns of Gods he fills the vacant sky ; 

 New herds of beast«i he sends the plains to share; 

 New colonies of birds to people air ; 

 And to their oozy beds the finny fish repair. 

 A creature of a more exalted kind 

 Wa> wanting yet, and then was man designed."' 



In such words the great })oet has embodied the popular 

 conception of the divisions of nature and of the relations 

 thereto of the animals which i)eople the world — one set for 

 the earth, a different creation for the land, and a third for 

 the air. These views, or some not essentially differing, were 

 current until within a comparatively recent period. 



It is easy by a merely superficial examination to convince 



*.4nte mare ettellus, et, quod tegit omnia, cojlum, 

 Unus erat toto-naturse vnltus in orbe, 

 Quem dixere Chaos; rudis indigcstaque moles; 



Hanc Deus et melior litem natura diremit ; 

 Nam ccclo terras, et terris abscidit tindas ; 



Neu regio foret uUa suis animantibiis orba ; 

 Astra tenent ccclestc solum, formteqne deorum ; 

 Cesserunt nitidis habitandie piscihns undoe; 

 Terra f eras cepit; colucres .igitabilis oiir. 



—Ovid Met. I, I. 5-7, 21-22, 72-76. 



