Of Athens o'er Ægina's gloomy surge,
To drive her clouds and storms; o'erwhelming all The Persian's promis'd glory, when the realms Of Indus and the soft Ionian clime,
When Libya's torrid champain and the rocks Of cold Imaüs join'd their servile bands, To sweep the sons of Liberty from Earth. In vain: Minerva on the bounding prow Of Athens stood, and with the thunder's voice Denounc'd her terrours on their impious heads, And shook her burning ægis. Xerxes saw : From Heracléum, on the mountain's height Thron'd in his golden car, he knew the sign Celestial; felt unrighteous hope forsake His faultering heart, and turn'd his face with shame. Hail, ye who share the stern Minerva's power; Who arm the hand of Liberty for war: And give to the renown'd Britannic name To awe contending monarchs: yet benign, Yet mild of nature; to the works of peace More prone, and lenient of the many ills Which wait on human life. Your gentle aid Hygeia well can witness; she who saves From poisonous cates and cups of pleasing bane, The wretch devoted to the entangling snares Of Bacchus and of Comus. Him she leads To Cynthia's lonely haunts.
To spread the toils, To beat the coverts, with the jovial horn
At dawn of day to summon the loud hounds,
She calls the lingering sluggard from his dreams : And where his breast may drink the mountain breeze, And where the fervour of the sunny vale
May beat upon his brow, through devious paths Beckons his rapid courser. Nor when ease,
Cool ease and welcome slumbers have becalm'd His eager bosom, does the queen of health Her pleasing care withhold. His decent board She guards, presiding; and the frugal powers With joy sedate leads in: and while the brown Ennæan dame with Pan presents her stores; While changing still, and comely in the change, Vertumnus and the Hours before him spread The garden's banquet; you to crown his feast, To crown his feast, O Naiads, you the fair Hygeia calls and from your shelving seats, And groves of poplar, plenteous cups ye bring, To slake his veins: till soon a purer tide Flows down those loaded channels; washeth off The dregs of luxury, the lurking seeds
Of crude disease; and through the abodes of life Sends vigour, sends repose. Hail, Naiads: hail, Who give, to labour, health; to stooping age, The joys which youth had squander'd. Oft your
Will I invoke; and, frequent in your praise, Abash the frantic Thyrsus with my song.
For not estrang'd from your benignant arts Is he, the god, to whose mysterious shrine My youth was sacred, and my votive cares Belong; the learned Pæon. Oft when all His cordial treasures he hath search'd in vain ; When herbs, and potent trees, and drops of balm Rich with the genial influence of the Sun, (To rouse dark Fancy from her plaintive dreams,
To brace the nerveless arm, with food to win Sick appetite, or hush the unquiet breast Which pines with silent passion,) he in vain Hath prov'd; to your deep mansions he descends, Your gates of humid rock, your dim arcades, He entereth; where empurpled veins of ore Gleam on the roof; where through the rigid mine Your trickling rills insinuate. There the god
From your indulgent hands the streaming bowl Wafts to his pale-ey'd suppliants; wafts the seeds Metallic, and the elemental salts
Wash'd from the pregnant glebe. They drink: and Flies pain; flies inauspicious care: and soon The social haunt or unfrequented shade
Hears Io, Io Pæan; as of old,
When Python fell. And, O propitious Nymphs, Oft as for helpless mortals I implore
Your salutary springs, through every urn Oh shed your healing treasures. With the first And finest breath, which from the genial strife Of mineral fermentation springs like light O'er the fresh morning's vapours, lustrate then The fountain, and inform the rising wave.
My lyre shall pay your bounty. Scorn not ye That humble tribute. Though a mortal hand Excite the strings to utterance, yet for themes Not unregarded of celestial powers,
I frame their language; and the Muses deign To guide the pious tenour of my lay. The Muses (sacred by their gifts divine) In early days did to my wondering sense Their secrets oft reveal: oft my rais'd ear
In slumber felt their music: oft at noon, Or hour of sunset, by some lonely stream, In field or shady grove, they taught me words Of power, from death and envy to preserve
The good man's name. Whence yet with grateful mind,
And offerings unprofan'd by ruder eye,
My vows I send, my homage, to the seats Of rocky Cirrha, where with you they dwell: Where you their chaste companions they admit Through all the hallow'd scene: where oft intent, And leaning o'er Castalia's mossy verge, They mark the cadence of your confluent urns, How tuneful, yielding gratefullest repose To their consorted measure: till again, With emulation all the sounding choir, And bright Apollo, leader of the song, Their voices through the liquid air exalt,
And sweep their lofty strings: those powerful strings That charm the mind of gods: that fill the courts Of wide Olympus with oblivion sweet
Of evils, with immortal rest from cares : Assuage the terrours of the throne of Jove; And quench the formidable thunderbolt Of unrelenting fire. With slacken'd wings, While now the solemn concert breathes around, Incumbent o'er the sceptre of his lord Sleeps the stern eagle; by the number'd notes, Possess'd; and satiate with the melting tone: Sovereign of birds. The furious god of war, His darts forgetting, and the winged wheels That bear him vengeful o'er the embattled plain,
Relents, and soothes his own fierce heart to ease,
The sire of gods and men,
In that great moment of divine delight, Looks down on all that live; and whatsoe'er He loves not, o'er the peopled earth, and o'er The interminated ocean, he beholds
Curs'd with abhorrence by his doom severe, And troubled at the sound. Ye Naiads, ye With ravish'd ears the melody attend
Worthy of sacred silence.
Of Bacchus with tempestuous clamours strive To drown the heavenly strains; of highest Jove Irreverent, and by mad presumption fir'd Their own discordant raptures to advance With hostile emulation. Down they rush From Nysa's vine-empurpled cliff, the dames Of Thrace, the Satyrs, and the unruly Fauns, With old Silenus, reeling through the crowd Which gambols round him, in convulsions wild Tossing their limbs, and brandishing in air The ivy-mantled thyrsus, or the torch
Through black smoke flaming, to the Phrygian pipe's Shrill voice, and to the clashing cymbals, mix'd
With shrieks and frantic uproar.
From every unpolluted ear avert
Their orgies! If within the seats of men, Within the walls, the gates, where Pallas holds The guardian key, if haply there be found Who loves to mingle with the revel-band And hearken to their accents; who aspires From such instructors to inform his breast With verse; let him, fit votarist, implore
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