This thing all things devours:
Birds, beasts, trees, flowers;
Gnaws iron, bites steel;
Grinds hard stones to meal;
Slays king, ruins town,
And beats high mountain down.
(In reply to
re: solution? by Tim Axoy)
Tim, the first line says this thing all things devours, not devour. A verb ending in "s" applies to a singular noun, not a plural noun. In other words, the first line is really saying, "This thing (time) devours all things," only the words are arranged in a more poetic syntax that was more common in the past than it is now and is more common to British authors than to Americans. Since "The Hobbit" was written by J.R.R. Tolkien (a Brit) in the 1930's, this makes sense.
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Posted by Bryan
on 2003-06-05 04:47:56 |
re(2): solution?
