the watery throng, Wave rolling after wave, where way they found: If steep, with torrent rapture, if through plain, Soft-ebbing; nor withstood them rock or hill; But they, or underground, or circuit wide With serpent error wandering, found their way, And on the washy ooze deep channels wore; Easy, ere God had bid the ground be dry, All but within those banks where rivers now Stream, and perpetual draw their humid train. The dry land Earth, and the great receptacle Of congregated waters he called seas; And saw that it was good, and said, ‘Let the Earth Put forth the verdant grass, herb yielding seed, And fruit-tree yielding fruit after her kind, Whose seed is in herself upon the Earth!’ He scarce had said when the bare Earth, till then Desert and bare, unsightly, unadorned, Brought forth the tender grass, whose verdure clad Her universal face with pleasant green; Then herbs of every leaf, that sudden flowered, Opening their various colours, and made gay Her bosom, smelling sweet; and, these scarce blown, Forth flourished thick the clustering vine, forth crept The smelling gourd, up stood the corny reed Embattled in her field: add the humble shrub, And bush with frizzled hair implicit: last Rose, as in dance, the stately trees, and spread Their branches hung with copious fruit, or gemmed Their blossoms. With high woods the hills were crowned, With tufts the valleys and each fountain-side, With borders long the rivers; that Earth now Seemed like to Heaven, a seat where gods might dwell, Or wander with delight, and love to haunt Her sacred shades; though God had yet not rained Upon the Earth, and man to till the ground None was, but from the Earth a dewy mist Went up and watered all the ground, and each Plant of the field, which ere it was in the Earth God made, and every herb, before it grew On the green stem. God saw that it was good; So even and morn recorded the third day.
“Nuevamente habló el Todopoderoso: ‘Haya lumbreras en lo alto de la expansión de los cielos, para dividir el día de la noche; y sean por señales, por estaciones, y por días, y por años en círculo; ¡y sean por lumbreras, según ordeno su oficio en el firmamento de los cielos, para dar luz sobre la Tierra!’ y así fue.