Let envy rage, and int'rest disapprove,
Envy and int'rest must submit to love.
By pray'rs and vows Hesione was won
To share the joys of hostile Telamon.
Soft gen'rous pity touch'd the captive dame *
Who arm'd Achilles with a lover's flame.
To bless the wretched, shows a soul divine-
Be ever angry-but be ever mine.
Yet can no pray'rs thy firm resentment move?
Wretch that I was so ill to fix my love!
See, at thy feet despairing, wild I roll,
Grief swells my heart, and anguish racks my soul:
There fix my doom; relentless to my sighs,
And lifted hands, and supplicating eyes.
Then wilt thou say (for pity sure must move
A virgin's breast)" How patient is his love!
Ev'n my heart trembles, as his tears I see;
The youth who serves so well, is worthy me."
Still must I then in sad destruction moan?
My cause unheeded, and my grief unknown.
Ah, no-Acontius cannot write in vain :
Sure ev'ry wretch has licence to complain!
But if you triumph in a lover's woe,
Remember still Diana is your foe:
Diana listen'd to the vows you made,
And trembled at the change her eyes survey'd.
Ah, think, repent, while yet the time is giv'n,
Fierce is the vengeance of neglected Heav'n!
By Dian's hand the Phrygian matron fell,
Sent with her race, an early shade to Hell.
Chang'd to a stag, Acteon pour'd away,
In the same morn the chaser and the prey.
Althea rag'd with more than female hate,
And hurl'd into the flames the brand of fate.
Like these offensive, punish'd too like these,
Heav'n blasts thy joys, and heightens the disease.
Nor think Cydippe, (as my fears foresee)
A thought unworthy of thyself, or me!
Think not I frame this seeming truth, to prove
Thy stern disdain, a pious fraud in love;
Rather than so, I yet abjure thy charms,
And yield thee, scornful, to another's arms!
Alas, for this pale sickness haunts thy bed,
And shooting aches seem to tear thy head;
A sudden vengeance waits thy guilty loves;
Absent is Hymen, Dian disapproves.

Think then, repent-recal the parting breath
O'er thy lips hov'ring in the hour of death,
See, on thy cheeks the fading purple dies,
And shades of darkness settle on thy eyes.
But whence, ye pow'rs, or wherefore rose that
pray'r?

Still must I mourn in absence, or despair;
Fore'd, if she dies, the promise to resign-
Ev'n if she lives, I must not call her mine!
Like some pale ghost around thy house I rove,
Now burn in rage, and now relent with love:
A thousand needless messages I make,
A thousand mournful speeches give, and take.
O that my skill the sov'reign virtues knew
Of ev'ry herb that drinks the early dew,
Then might I hear thy moans, thy sickness see,
Nor were it sure a crime to gaze on thee.
Perhaps ev'n now, (as fear foresees too well)
The wretch I curse,detest, avoid like Hell,
Beside thee breathes a love-dejected sigh,
And marks the silent glances of thy eye.

Briseïs

Some faint excuse he raises, to detain
Thy swelling arm, and press the beating vein:
Now o'er thy neck his glowing fingers rove,
Too great a pleasure for so mean a love!
Villain beware! the sacred nymph resign,-
Avoid, detest her, dread whate'er is mine;
Elsewhere a lover's preference I give,
But cease to rival here, or cease to live.
The vows you claim by right of human laws,
At best but serve to vindicate my cause.
To thee alone by duty is she kind;
Can parents alienate a daughter's mind?
First weigh the crime, the vengeance next explore,
The father promis'd, but the daughter swore:
That merely vain on human faith relies
But this obtests the sanction of the skies.

Here cease my woes-ah, whither am I born,
A woman's triumph, and a rival's scorn?
Vain are my vows, unheeded is my pray❜r,
The scatt'ring winds have lost 'em all in air;
Yet think Cydippe, e'er thy lover dies!
Banish that wretch for ever from thy eyes;
Scorn, envy, censures are conferr'd on me,
And pain, and death is all he brings to thee.
Gods! may some vengeance crimes like these atone,
And snatch his life, to mediate for thy own!

Nor think to please avenging Cynthia's eyes
With streams of blood in holy sacrifice:
Heav'n claims the real, not the formal part,
A troubled spirit, and repenting heart.
For ease, and health, the patient oft requires
The piercing steel, and burns alive in fires;
Not so with you-ah, but confirm the vow!
One look, one promise can restore thee now;
Again thy smiles eternal joys bestow,
And thy eyes sparkle, and thy blushes glow.
Suppose from me for ever you remove,
Once must you fall a sacrifice to love;
And then, ah, then will angry Cynthia close
Thy wakeful eyes, or ease a matron's throes?
Yet wilt thou ever find a cause for shame?
No sure a mother cannot, must not blame.
Tell her the vow, the place, the sacred day
I gaz'd on thee, and gaz'd my heart away:
Then will she surely say (if e'er she knew
But half that tender love I feel for you)

Ah, think Cydippe, and his consort be;
The youth who pleas'd Diana, pleases me !"
Yet if she asks (as women oft inquire)
Tell her my life, my nation, and my sire:
Not void of youthful vanities I came,
Nor yet inglorions in the world of fame;
From ancient race I drew my gen'rous blood,
Where Cea's isle o'erlooks the watry flood:
Add, that I study ev'ry art to please,
Blest in my genius, born to live at ease.
Wit, merit, learning cannot fail to move,
And all those dearer blessings lost in love!
Ah! had you never sworn, 'twere hard to chuse
A love like mine and will you now refuse?

In midnight dreams when wakeful fancy keeps
Its dearest thoughts, and ev'n in slumber weeps,
Diana's self these mournful strains inspir'd,
And Cupid when I wak'd, my genius fir'd.
Methinks, ev'n now, his piercing arrows move
My tender breast, and spread the pains of love.
Like me beware, unhappy as thou art!
Direct at thee Diana aims her dart

To drink the blood that feeds thy faithless heart

The loves thou never can'st enjoy, resign;
Nor rashly lose another life with thine.
Then will we, eager as our joys, remove
To Dian's shrine, the patroness of love!
High o'er ber head in triumph shall be plac'd
The golden fruit, with this inscription grac'd;
"Ye hapless lovers hence, for ever know
Acontius gain'd the nymph who caus'd his woe!"
Here cease my hand-I tremble, lest each line
Should wound a soul so griev'd, so touch'd as thine.
No more my thoughts th' ungrateful toil pursue;
Pleasure farewell, and thou, my dear, adieu!

This ode is address'd to Hieron king of Sicily, as is also the first of the Olympics. Pindar takes occasion to begin with an encomium on music, finely describing its effects upon the passions. We must suppose this art to be one of his hero's more distinguishable excellencies; as it appears from several passages in the ode above. From thence he expatiates in the praise of poetry; and inveighs very severely upon those who either contemn, or have no taste for that divine science. Their misfortunes and punishments are instanc'd by those of Typhoeus: whom the poets imagine to be imprisoned by Jupiter under mount Etna. sions in this ode are the most inartificial and The digres surprising of any in the whole author. We are once more in the hero's native country; every thing opens agreeably to the eye, and the poem proceeds after Pindar's usual man

per.

STROPHE I.

GENTLE lyre, begin the strain;
Wake the string to voice again.
Music rules the world above;
Music is the food of love.
Soft'ned by the pow'r of sound,
Human passions melt away:
Melancholy feels no wound,

Envy sleeps, and fears decay.

Entranc'd in pleasure Jove's dread eagle lies,
Nor grasps the bolt, nor darts his fiery eyes.
ANTISTROPHe (.

See, Mars awak'd by loud alarms
Rolls o'er the field his sanguine eyes,
His heart tumultuous beats to arms,
And terrours glare, and furies rise!
Hark the pleasing lutes complain,
In a softly-breathing strain;
Love and slumber seal his eye
By the gentle charms opprest:
From his rage he steals a sigh,
Sinking on Dione's breast.
EPODE I

Verse,gentle Verse from Heav'ndescending came,
Cust by the wicked, hateful to the vain:
Tyrants and slaves profane his sacred name,
Deaf to the tender lay, or vocal strain........

The pious mariner when first he sweeps
The foaming billows, and exalts his sails,
Propitiates ev'ry pow'r that rules the deeps,
Led by new hopes, and borne by gentle gales.
So ere the Muse, disus'd to sing,
Emblazons her fair hero's praise:
(What time she wakes the trembling string,
Attemper'd to the vocal lays)
Frostrate in humble guise she bends,
While some celestial pow'r descends

To guide her airy flights along :
God of the silver bow, give ear;
(Whom Tenedos, and Chrysa fear)
Observant of the song!

STROPHE III.

Gentle wishes, chaste desires,
Holy Hymen's purer fires:
Lives of innocence and pleasure,
Moral virtue's mystic treasure;
Wisdom, eloquence, and love,
All are blessings from above.
Hence regret, distaste, dispraise,
Guilty nights, uneasy days:
Repining jealousies, calm friendly wrongs,
And fiercer envy, and the strife of tongues.

ANTISTROPHE III.

When Virtue bleeds beneath the laws,
Or ardent nations rise in arms,
Thy mercies judge the doubtful cause,
Thy courage ev'ry breast alarms.
Kindling with heroic fire
Once again I sweep the lyre.

Fair as summer's evening skies,
Erls thy life serene, and glorious;
Happy hero, great and wise,
O'er thy foes, and self victorious.

THE EPISODE OF ORPHEUS AND
EURYDICE,

TRANSLATED FROM THE FOURTH GEORGIC OF
VIRGIL.

At chorus æqualis Dryadum—

HER Sudden death the mountain-Dryads mourn'd
And Rhodope's high brow the dirge return'd:
Bleak Orythya trembled at their woe,
And silver Hebrus murmur'd in his flow.
While to his mournful harp, unseen, alone,
Despairing Orpheus warbled out his moan.
With rosy dawn his plaintive lays begun,
His plaintive voice sung down the setting Sun.
Now in the frantic bitterness of woe
Silent he treads the dreary realms below,
His loss in tender numbers to deplore,

And touch'd the souls who ne'er were touch'd
before.

Mov'd with the pleasing harmony of song,
The shadowy spectres round the poet throng:
Num'rous as birds that o'er the forest play,
(When evening Phoebus rolls the light away:
Or when high Jove in wintry seasons pours
A sudden deluge from descending show'rs.)
The mother's ghost, the father's rev'rend shade,
The blooming hero, and th' unmarry'd maid:
The new-born heir who soon lamented dies,
And feeds the flames before his parent's eyes;
All whom Cocytus' sable water bounds,

And Styx with thrice three wand'ring streams
surrounds.

See, the dread regions tremble and admire!
Ev'n Pain unmov'd stands heark'ning to the lyre.
Intent, Ixion stares, nor seems to feel
The rapid motions of the whirling wheel.
Th' unfolding snakes around the furies play,
As the pale sisters listen to the lay.

Nor was the poet's moving suit deny'd,
Again to realms above he bears his bride,
When (stern decree !) he turns his longing eyes...
'Tis done, she's lost, for ever ever flies-
Too small the fault, too lasting was the pain,
Could love but judge, or Hell relent again!
Amaz'd he stands, and by the glimpse of day
Just sees th' unbody'd shadow flit away.
When thus she cry'd-"Ah, too unthoughtful
Thus for one look to violate thy vows!
Fate bears me back, again to Hell I fly,
Eternal darkness swims before my eye!
Again the melancholy plains I see, [thee!"
Ravish'd from life, from pleasure, and from
She said, and sinking into endless night,
Like exhalations vanish'd from the sight.
In vain he sprung to seize her, wept, or pray'd,
Swift glides away the visionary shade.

[spouse,

How wilt thou now, unhappy Orpheus, tell Thy second loss, and melt the pow'rs of Hell? Cold are those lips that blest thy soul before, And her fair eyes must roll on thine no more. Sev'n tedious moons despairing, wild he stood, And told his woes to Strymon's freezing flood.

Beneath his feet eternal snows were spread,
And airy rocks hang nodding o'er his head,
The savage beasts in circles round him play,
And rapid streams stand list'ning to the lay.

So when the shepherd swain with curious eyes
Marks the fair nest, and makes the young his
Sad. Philomel, in poplar shades alone, [prize:
In vain renews her lamentable moan.
From night to morn she chants her tender love,
And mournful music dies along the grove.

No thoughts of pleasure now his soul employ,
Averse to Venus and the nuptial joy:
Wild as the winds o'er Thracia's plains he roves,
O'er the bleak mountains, and the leafless groves.
When stung with rage the Bacchanalian train
Rush'd to the bard, and stretch'd him on the

UPON THE BIRTH OF LORD BEAUCHAMP.

ONCE more inspir'd, I touch the trembling
string;

What Muse for Hertford will refuse to sing?
Thine are the fav'rite strains, and may they be
Sacred to praise, to beauty, and to thee!

Sudden, methinks, in vision I survey
The glorious triumphs of th' expected day:
Fair lovely sights in opening scenes appear,
And airy music trembles on my ear;
Surrounding eyes devour the beauteous boy,
And ev'ry bosom beats with sounds of joy.

Rise from thy slumbers, gentle infant, rise!
Lift thy fair head, unfold thy radiant eyes,
Whose lovely light must other courts adorn,
And wound the hearts of beauties yet unborn,
Subdue the sex, that triumphs in its pride,
And humble those, who charm the world beside.
Descend, ye gentle Nine! descend, and spread
Laurels and bays around his infant-head.
Bid noble passions in his bosom roll,
And beams of fancy dawn upon his soul;
In soften'd music bid his accents flow,
Piercing, and gentle as descending snow:
Bid him be all that can his birth commend ;
The daring patriot, and unshaken friend;
Admir'd, yet humble, modest, though severe,
Abroad obliging, and at home sincere;
Good, just, and affable in each degree:
Such is the father, such the son shall be!
These humble strains, indulgent Hertford,