acquire
Each passing 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 mass 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 quantity 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