A World Made By Atoms
Small atoms of themselves a world may make,
As being subtle, and of every shape:
And as they dance about, fit places find,
Such forms as best agree, make every kind.
For when we build a house of brick, and stone,
We lay them even, every one by one:
And when we find a gap that’s big, or small,
We seek out stones, to fit that place withall.
For when not fit, too big, or little be,
They fall away, and cannot stay we see.
So atoms, as they dance, find places fit,
They there remain, lie close, and fast will stick.
Those that unfit, the rest that rove about,
Do never leave, until they thrust them out.
Thus by their several motions, and their forms,
As several work-men serve each others turns.
And thus, by chance, may a new world create:
Or else predestined to work my fate.
From Poems and Fancies (J. Martin and J. Allestrye, 1653). This poem is in the public domain.
Margaret Cavendish
Margaret Cavendish, Duchess of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, born Margaret Lucas at Saint John’s Abbey, Essex, was a seventeenth-century poet, philosopher, playwright, and essayist. Although she received little formal education, Cavendish had access to libraries and tutors and began to write down her ideas at an early age, as well as engage in intellectual conversations with her brother, Sir John Lucas.