II

The Sun and the serenest Moon sprang forth:

The burning stars of the abyss were hurled

Into the depths of Heaven. The daedal earth,

That island in the ocean of the world,

Hung in its cloud of all-sustaining air:

But this divinest universe

Was yet a chaos and a curse,

For thou wert not: but, power from worst producing worse,

The spirit of the beasts was kindled there,

And of the birds, and of the watery forms,

And there was war among them, and despair

Within them, raging without truce or terms:

The bosom of their violated nurse

Groaned, for beasts warred on beasts, and worms on worms,

And men on men; each heart was as a hell of storms.