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"To thee, O Proferpine! this ifle I give," Said Jove, and, as he faid,

Smil'd, and bent his gracious head.

"And thou, O isle!" faid he, " for ever thrive, " And keep the value of our gift alive!

"As Heaven with stars, so let

"The country thick with towns be set,
"And numberless as stars!

"Let all the towns be then

"Replenish'd thick with men,

"Wife in peace, and bold in wars !
"Of thousand glorious towns the nation,

" Of thousand glorious men each town a conftellation! "Nor let their warlike laurel scorn,

"With the Olympic olive to be worn,

" Whose gentler honours do so well the brows of peace

" adorn!"

Go to great Syracuse, my Muse, and wait
At Chromius' hospitable gate;
'Twill open wide to let thee in,

When thy lyre's voice shall but begin;
Joy, plenty, and free welcome, dwells within.
The Tyrian beds thou shalt find ready drest,
The ivory table crowded with a feast:
The table which is free for every guest,
No doubt will thee admit,

And feaft more upon thee, than thou on it.
Chromius and thou art met aright,
For, as by nature thou dost write,

So he by nature loves, and does by nature fight.
VOL. II.

C

Nature

Nature herself, whilst in the womb he was,
Sow'd strength and beauty through the forming mass;
They mov'd the vital lump in every part,

• And carv'd the members out with wondrous art.
She fill'd his mind with courage, and with wit,
And a vast bounty, apt and fit

For the great dower which Fortune made to it.
'Tis madness sure treasures to hoard,
And make them useless, as in mines, remain,
To lofe th' occafion Fortune does afford

Fame and public love to gain :
Ev'n for felf-concerning ends,
'Tis wifer much to hoard-up friends.
Though happy men the present goods poffefs,
Th' unhappy have their share in future hopes no lefs.

How early has young Chromius begun
The race of virtue, and how swiftly run,

And borne the noble prize away,
Whilst other youths yet at the barriers stay!
None but Alcides e'er set earlier forth than he:
The God, his father's, blood nought could restrain,

'Twas ripe at first, and did disdain

The flow advance of dull humanity.
The big-limb'd babe in his huge cradle lay,
Too weighty to be rock'd by nurse's hands,
Wrapt in purple swadling-bands;

When, lo! by jealous Juno's fierce commands,
Two dreadful ferpents come,

Rolling and hiffing loud, into the room;
To the bold babe they trace their bidden way;

Forth

Forth from their flaming eyes dread lightnings went, Their gaping mouths did forked tongues, like thunder

bolts, prefent.

Some of th' amazed women dropt down dead
With fear, fome wildly fled

About the room, some into corners crept,

Where filently they shook and wept:

All naked from her bed the paffionate mother leap'd, To fave or perish with her child,

She trembled, and the cry'd; the mighty infant fmil'd: The mighty infant feem'd well pleas'd

At his gay gilded foes;

And, as their spotted necks up to the cradle rofe,
With his young warlike hands on both he feiz'd;
In 'vain they rag'd, in vain they hifs'd,
In vain their armed tails they twift,

And angry circles caft about;

Black blood, and fiery breath, and poisonous foul, he

squeezes out!

With their drawn fwords

In ran Amphitryo and the Theban lords;
With doubting wonder, and with troubled joy,

They faw the conquering boy

Laugh, and point downwards to his prey,

Where, in death's pangs and their own gore, they fold

ing lay.

When wife Tirefias this beginning knew,

He told with eafe the things t' enfue;

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From what monsters he should free
The earth, the air, and fea;
What mighty tyrants he should slay,
Greater monsters far than they ;

How much at Phlægra's field the distrest Gods should owe
To their great offspring here below;

And how his club should there outdo

Apollo's filver bow, and his own father's thunder too.

And that the grateful Gods, at last, The race of his laborious virtue paft,

Heaven, which he sav'd, should to him give; Where, marry'd to eternal youth, he should for ever

live;

Drink nectar with the Gods, and all his senses please In their harmonious, golden palaces;

Walk with ineffable delight

Through the thick groves of never-withering light,
And, as he walks, affright
The lion and the bear,

Bull, centaur, fcorpion, all the radiant monsters there.

THE PRAISE OF PINDAR. In imitation of HORACE's second Ode, B. IV. " Pindarum quisquis studet æmulari, &c."

PINDAR is imitable by none;

The Phoenix Pindar is a vast species alone. Who e'er but Dædalus with waxen wings could fly, And neither fink too low nor foar too high ?

What

i

PRAISE OF PINDAR. 21

What could he who follow'd claim,

But of vain boldness the unhappy fame,
And by his fall a fea to name ?
Pindar's unnavigable fong

Like a fwoln flood from fome steep mountain pours along;
The ocean meets with fuch a voice,

From his enlarged mouth, as drowns the ocean's noife.

So Pindar does new words and figures roll
Down his impetuous dithyrambic tide,

Which in no channel deigns t' abide,
Which neither banks nor dykes control:
Whether th' immortal Gods he fings,

In a no less immortal strain,
Or the great acts of God-defcended kings,
Who in his numbers still furvive and reign;
Each rich-embroider'd line,
Which their triumphant brows around,
By his facred hand is bound,
Does all their starry diadems outshine.

Whether at Pifa's race he please

To carve in polish'd verse the conqueror's images;
Whether the swift, the skilful, or the strong,
Be crowned in his nimble, artful, vigorous fong;
Whether fome brave young man's untimely fate,
In words worth dying for, he celebrate-

Such mournful, and fuch pleasing words,
As joy to his mother's and his mistress' grief affords -

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