The Odysseys of Homer, together with the shorter poems

by Homer

BATRACHOMYOMACHIA

Ent’ring the fields, first let my vows call on
The Muses’ whole quire out of Helicon
Into my heart, for such a poem’s sake,
As lately I did in my tables take,
And put into report upon my knees.
A fight so fierce, as might in all degrees
Fit Mars himself, and his tumultuous hand,
Glorying to dart to th’ ears of every land
Of all the voice-divided;[1] and to show
How bravely did both Frogs and Mice bestow
In glorious fight their forces, even the deeds
Daring to imitate of Earth’s Giant Seeds.
Thus then men talk’d; this seed the strife begat:
The Mouse once dry, and ’scaped the dangerous cat,
Drench’d in the neighbour lake her tender beard,
To taste the sweetness of the wave it rear’d.
The far-famed Fen-affecter, seeing him, said:
“Ho, stranger! What are you, and whence, that tread
This shore of ours? Who brought you forth? Reply
What truth may witness, lest I find you lie.
If worth fruition of my love and me,
I’ll have thee home, and hospitality
Of feast and gift, good and magnificent,
Bestow on thee; for all this confluent
Resounds my royalty; my name, the great
In blown-up-count’nances and looks of threat,
Physignathus,[2] adored of all Frogs here
All their days’ durance, and the empire bear
Of all their beings; mine own being begot
By royal Peleus,[3] mix’d in nuptial knot
With fair Hydromedusa,[4] on the bounds
Near which Eridanus[5] his race resounds.
And thee mine eye makes my conceit inclined
To reckon powerful both in form and mind,
A sceptre-bearer, and past others far
Advanc’d in all the fiery fights of war.
Come then, thy race to my renown commend.”
The Mouse made answer: “Why inquires my friend?
For what so well know men and Deities,
And all the wing’d affecters of the skies?
Psicharpax[6] I am call’d; Troxartes’[7] seed,
Surnamed the mighty-minded. She that freed
Mine eyes from darkness was Lichomyle,[8]
King Pternotroctes’[9] daughter, showing me,
Within an aged hovel, the young light,
Fed me with figs and nuts, and all the height
Of varied viands. But unfold the cause,
Why, ’gainst similitude’s most equal laws
Observed in friendship, thou mak’st me thy friend?
Thy life the waters only help t’ extend;
Mine, whatsoever men are used to eat,
Takes part with them at shore; their purest cheat,
Thrice boulted, kneaded, and subdued in paste,
In clean round kymnels, cannot be so fast
From my approaches kept but in I eat;
Nor cheesecakes full of finest Indian wheat,
That crusty-weeds[10] wear, large as ladies’ trains;
Liverings,[11] white-skinn’d as ladies; nor the strains,
Of press’d milk, renneted; nor collops cut
Fresh from the flitch; nor junkets, such as put
Palates divine in appetite; nor any
Of all men’s delicates, though ne’er so many
Their cooks devise them, who each dish see deckt
With all the dainties all strange soils affect.[12]
Yet am I not so sensual to fly
Of fields embattled the most fiery cry,
But rush out straight, and with the first in fight
Mix in adventure. No man with affright
Can daunt my forces, though his body be
or never so immense a quantity,
But making up, even to his bed, access,
His fingers’ ends dare with my teeth compress,
His feet taint likewise, and so soft seize both
They shall not taste th’ impression of a tooth.
Sweet sleep shall hold his own in every eye
Where my tooth takes his tartest liberty.
But two there are, that always, far and near,
Extremely still control my force with fear,
The Cat, and Night-hawk, who much scathe confer
On all the outrays where for food I err.
Together with the straits-still-keeping trap,[13]
Where lurks deceitful and set-spleen’d mishap.
But most of all the Cat constrains my fear,
Being ever apt t’ assault me everywhere;
For by that hole that hope says I shall ’scape,
At that hole ever she commits my rape.
The best is yet, I eat no pot-herb grass,
Nor radishes, nor coloquintidas,
Nor still-green beets, nor parsley; which you make
Your dainties still, that live upon the lake.”
The Frog replied: “Stranger, your boasts creep all
Upon their bellies; though to our lives fall
Much more miraculous meats by lake and land,
Jove tend’ring our lives with a twofold hand,
Enabling us to leap ashore for food,
And hide us straight in our retreatful flood.
Which, if you will serve, you may prove with ease.
I’ll take you on my shoulders; which fast seize,
If safe arrival at my house y’ intend.”
He stoop’d, and thither spritely did ascend,
Clasping his golden neck, that easy seat
Gave to his sally; who was jocund yet,
Seeing the safe harbours of the king so near,
And he a swimmer so exempt from peer.
But when he sunk into the purple wave,
He mourn’d extremely, and did much deprave
Unprofitable penitence; his hair
Tore by the roots up, labour’d for the air
With his feet fetch’d up to his belly close;
His heart within him panted out repose,
For th’ insolent plight in which his state did stand;
Sigh’d bitterly, and long’d to greet the land,
Forced by the dire need of his freezing fear.
First, on the waters he his tail did stere,
Like to a stern; then drew it like an oar,
Still praying the Gods to set him safe ashore;
Yet sunk he midst the red waves more and more,
And laid a throat out to his utmost height;
Yet in forced speech he made his peril slight,
And thus his glory with his grievance strove:
“Not in such choice state was the charge of love
Borne by the bull, when to the Cretan shore
He swum Europa through the wavy roar,
As this Frog ferries me, his pallid breast
Bravely advancing, and his verdant crest
(Submitted to my seat) made my support,
Through his white waters, to his royal court.”
But on the sudden did apparance make
An horrid spectacle,—a Water-snake
Thrusting his freckled neck above the lake.
Which seen to both, away Physignathus
Dived to his deeps, as no way conscious
Of whom he left to perish in his lake,
But shunn’d black fate himself, and let him take
The blackest of it; who amidst the fen
Swum with his breast up, hands held up in vain,
Cried Peepe, and perish’d; sunk the waters oft,
And often with his sprawlings came aloft,
Yet no way kept down death’s relentless force,
But, full of water, made an heavy corse.
Before he perish’d yet, he threaten’d thus:
“Thou lurk’st not yet from heaven, Physignathus,
Though yet thou hid’st here, that hast cast from thee,
As from a rock, the shipwrack’d life of me,
Though thou thyself no better was than I,
O worst of things, at any faculty,
Wrastling or race. But, for thy perfidy
In this my wrack, Jove bears a wreakful eye;
And to the host of Mice thou pains shalt pay,
Past all evasion.” This his life let say,
And left him to the waters. Him beheld
Lichopinax,[14] placed in the pleasing field,
Who shriek’d extremely, ran and told the Mice;
Who having heard his wat’ry destinies,
Pernicious anger pierced the hearts of all,
And then their heralds forth they sent to call
A council early, at Troxartes’ house,
Sad father of this fatal shipwrack’d Mouse;
Whose dead corse upwards swum along the lake,
Nor yet, poor wretch, could be enforced to make
The shore his harbour, but the mid-main Swum.
When now, all haste made, with first morn did come
All to set council; in which first rais’d head
Troxartes, angry for his son, and said:
“O friends, though I alone may seem to bear
All the infortune, yet may all met here
Account it their case. But ’tis true, I am
In chief unhappy, that a triple flame
Of life feel put forth, in three famous sons;
The first, the chief in our confusions,
The Cat, made rape of, caught without his hole:
The second, Man, made with a cruel soul,
Brought to his ruin with a new-found sleight,
And a most wooden engine of deceit,
They term a Trap, mere murth’ress of our Mice.
The last, that in my love held special price,
And his rare mother’s, this Physignathus
(With false pretext of wafting to his house)
Strangled in chief deeps of his bloody stream.
Come then, haste all, and issue out on them,
Our bodies deck’d in our Dædalean arms.”
This said, his words thrust all up in alarms,
And Mars himself, that serves the cure of war,
Made all in their appropriates circular.
First on each leg the green shales of a bean
They closed for boots, that sat exceeding clean;[15]
The shales they broke ope, boothaling by night,
And ate the beans; their jacks art exquisite
Had shown in them, being cats’ skins, everywhere
Quilted with quills; their fenceful bucklers were
The middle rounds of can’sticks; but their spear
A huge long needle was, that could not bear
The brain of any but be Mars his own
Mortal invention; their heads’ arming crown
Was vessel to the kernel of a nut.
And thus the Mice their powers in armour put.
This the Frogs hearing, from the water all
Issue to one place, and a council call
Of wicked war; consulting what should be
Cause to this murmur and strange mutiny.
While this was question’d, near them made his stand
An herald with a sceptre in his hand,
Embasichytrus[16] call’d, that fetch’d his kind
From Tyroglyphus[17] with the mighty mind,
Denouncing ill-named war in these high terms:
“O Frogs! the Mice send threats to you of arms,
And bid me bid ye battle and fix’d fight;
Their eyes all wounded with Psicharpax’ sight
Floating your waters, whom your king hath kill’d,
And therefore all prepare for force of field,
You that are best born whosoever held.”
This said, he sever’d: his speech firing th’ ears
Of all the Mice, but freez’d the Frogs with fears,
Themselves conceiting guilty; whom the king
Thus answer’d, rising, “Friends! I did not bring
Psicharpax to his end; he, wantoning
Upon our waters, practising to swim,
Aped us,[18] and drown’d without my sight of him.
And yet these worst of vermin accuse me,
Though no way guilty. Come, consider we
How we may ruin these deceitful Mice.
For my part, I give voice to this advice,
As seeming fittest to direct our deeds:
Our bodies decking with our arming weeds,
Let all our pow’rs stand rais’d in steep’st repose
Of all our shore; that, when they charge us close,
We may the helms snatch off from all so deckt,
Daring our onset, and them all deject
Down to our waters; who, not knowing the sleight.
To dive our soft deeps, may be strangled straight,
And we triumphing may a trophy rear,
Of all the Mice that we have slaughter’d here.”
These words put all in arms; and mallow leaves
They drew upon their legs, for arming greaves.[19]
Their curets, broad green beets; their bucklers were
Good thick-leaved cabbage, proof ’gainst any spear;
Their spears sharp bulrushes, of which were all
Fitted with long ones; their parts capital
They hid in subtle cockleshells from blows.
And thus all arm’d, the steepest shores they chose
T’ encamp themselves; where lance with lance they lined,
And brandish’d bravely, each Frog full of mind.
Then Jove call’d all Gods in his flaming throne,
And show’d all all this preparation
For resolute war; these able soldiers,
Many, and great, all shaking lengthful spears,
In show like Centaurs, Or the Giants’ host.
When, sweetly smiling, he inquired who, most
Of all th’ Immortals, pleased to add their aid
To Frogs or Mice; and thus to Pallas said:
“O Daughter! Must not your needs aid these Mice,
That, with the odours and meat sacrifice
Used in your temple, endless triumphs make,
And serve you for your sacred victuals’ sake?”
Pallas replied: “O Father, never I
Will aid the Mice in any misery.
So many mischiefs by them I have found,
Eating the cotton that my distaffs crown’d,[20]
My lamps still haunting to devour the oil.
But that which most my mind eats, is their spoil
Made of a veil, that me in much did stand,
On which bestowing an elaborate hand,
A fine woof working of as pure a thread;
Such holes therein their petulancies fed
That, putting it to darning, when ’twas done,
The darner a most dear pay stood upon
For his so dear pains, laid down instantly;
Or, to forbear, exacted usury.[21]
So, borrowing from my fane the weed I wove,
I can by no means th’ usurous darner move
To let me have the mantle to restore.
And this is it that rubs the angry sore
Of my offence took at these petulant Mice.
Nor will I yield the Frogs’ wants my supplies,
For their infirm minds that no confines keep;
For I from war retir’d, and wanting sleep,
All leap’d ashore in tumult, nor would stay
Till one wink seized mine eyes, and so I lay
Sleepless, and pain’d with headache, till first light
The cock had crow’d up. Therefore, to the fight
Let no God go assistant, lest a lance
Wound whosoever offers to advance,
Or wishes but their aid, that scorn all foes;
Should any God’s access their spirits oppose.
Sit we then pleased to see from heaven their fight.”
She said, and all Gods join’d in her delight.
And now both hosts to one field drew the jar,
Both heralds bearing the ostents of war.
And then the wine-gnats,[22] that shrill trumpets sound,
Terribly rung out the encounter round;
Jove thund’red; all heaven sad war’s sign resounded.
And first Hypsiboas[23] Lichenor[24] wounded,
Standing th’ impression of the first in fight.
His lance did in his liver’s midst alight,
Along his belly. Down he fell; his face
His fall on that part sway’d, and all the grace
Of his soft hair fil’d with disgraceful dust.
Then Troglodytes[25] his thick javelin thrust
In Pelion’s[26] bosom, bearing him to ground,
Whom sad death seiz’d; his soul flew through his wound.
Seutlæus[27] next Embasichytros slew,
His heart through-thrusting. Then Artophagus[28] threw
His lance at Polyphon,[29] and struck him quite
Through his mid-belly; down he fell upright,
And from his fair limbs took his soul her flight.
Limnocharis,[30] beholding Polyphon
Thus done to death, did, with as round a stone
As that the mill turns, Troglodytes wound,
Near his mid-neck, ere he his onset found;
Whose eyes sad darkness seiz’d. Lichenor[31] cast
A flying dart off, and his aim so placed
Upon Limnocharis; that sure he thought[32]
The wound he wish’d him; nor untruly wrought
The dire success, for through his liver flew
The fatal lance; which when Crambophagus[33] knew,
Down the deep waves near shore he, diving, fled;
But fled not fate so; the stern enemy fed
Death with his life in diving; never more
The air he drew in; his vermilion gore
Stain’d all the waters, and along the shore
He laid extended; his fat entrails lay
(By his small guts’ impulsion) breaking way
Out at his wound. Limnisius[34] near the shore
Destroy’d Tyroglyphus. Which frighted sore
The soul of Calaminth,[35] seeing coming on,
For wreak, Pternoglyphus;[36] who got him gone
With large leaps to the lake, his target thrown
Into the waters. Hydrocharis[37] slew
King Pternophagus,[38] at whose throat he threw
A huge stone, strook it high, and beat his brain
Out at his nostrils. Earth blush’d with the stain
His blood made on her bosom. For next prise,
Lichopinax to death did sacrifice
Borboroccetes’[39] faultless faculties;
His lance enforced it; darkness closed his eyes.
On which when Prassophagus[40] cast his look,
Cnissodioctes[41] by the heels he took,
Dragg’d him to fen from off his native ground,
Then seized his throat, and soused him till he drown’d
But now Psicharpax wreaks his fellows’ deaths,
And in the bosom of Pelusius[42] sheaths,
In centre of his liver, his bright lance.
He fell before the author of the chance;
His soul to hell fled. Which Pelobates[43]
Taking sad note of, wreakfully did seize
His hand’s gripe full of mud, and all besmear’d
His forehead with it so, that scarce appear’d
The light to him. Which certainly incensed
His fiery spleen; who with his wreak dispensed
No point of time, but rear’d with his strong hand
A stone so massy it oppress’d the land,
And hurl’d it at him; when below the knee
It strook his right leg so impetuously
It piecemeal brake it; he the dust did seize,
Upwards everted. But Craugasides[44]
Revenged his death, and at his enemy
Discharged a dart that did his point imply
In his mid-belly. All the sharp-pil’d spear
Got after in, and did before it bear
His universal entrails to the earth,
Soon as his swoln hand gave his jav’lin birth.
Sitophagus,[45] beholding the sad sight,
Set on the shore, went halting from the fight,
Vex’d with his wounds extremely; and, to make
Way from extreme fate, leap’d into the lake.
Troxartes strook, in th’ instep’s upper part,
Physignathus; who (privy to the smart
His wound imparted) with his utmost haste
Leap’d to the lake, and fled. Troxartes cast
His eye upon the foe that fell before,
And, seeing him half-liv’d, long’d again to gore
His gutless bosom; and, to kill him quite,
Ran fiercely at him. Which Prassseus’[46] sight
Took instant note of, and the first in fight
Thrust desp’rate way through, casting his keen lance
Off at Troxartes; whose shield turn’d th’ advance
The sharp head made, and check’d the mortal chance.
Amongst the Mice fought an egregious
Young springall, and a close-encount’ring Mouse,
Pure Artepibulus’s[47] dear descent;
A prince that Mars himself show’d where he went.
(Call’d Meridarpax,[48]) of so huge a might,
That only he still domineer’d in fight
Of all the Mouse-host. He advancing close
Up to the lake, past all the rest arose
In glorious object, and made vaunt that he
Came to depopulate all the progeny
Of Frogs, affected with the lance of war.
And certainly he had put on as far
As he advanced his vaunt, he was endu’d
With so unmatch’d a force and fortitude,
Had not the Father both of Gods and men
Instantly known it, and the Frogs, even then
Given up to ruin, rescued with remorse.
Who, his head moving, thus began discourse:
“No mean amaze affects me, to behold
Prince Meridarpax rage so uncontroll’d,
In thirst of Frog-blood, all along the lake.
Come therefore still, and all addression make,
Despatching Pallas, with tumultuous Mars,
Down to the field, to make him leave the wars,
How potently soever he be said[49]
Where he attempts once to uphold his head.”
Mars answer’d: “O Jove, neither She nor I,
With both our aids, can keep depopulacy
From off the Frogs! And therefore arm we all,
Even thy lance letting brandish to his call
From off the field, that from the field withdrew
The Titanois, the Titanois that slew,
Though most exempt from match of all earth’s Seeds,
So great and so inaccessible deeds
It hath proclaim’d to men; bound hand and foot
The vast Enceladus; and rac’d by th’ root
The race of upland Giants.” This speech past,
Saturnius a smoking lightning cast
Amongst the armies, thund’ring then so sore,
That with a rapting circumflex he bore
All huge heaven over. But the terrible ire
Of his dart, sent abroad, all wrapt in fire,
(Which certainly his very finger was)
Amazed both Mice and Frogs. Yet soon let pass
Was all this by the Mice, who much the more
Burn’d in desire t’ exterminate the store
Of all those lance-loved soldiers. Which had been,
If from Olympus Jove’s eye had not seen
The Frogs with pity, and with instant speed
Sent them assistants. Who, ere any heed
Was given to their approach, came crawling on
With anvils on their backs, that, beat upon[50]
Never so much, are never wearied yet;
Crook-paw’d, and wrested on with foul cloven feet,
Tongues in their mouths,[51] brick-back’d, all over bone,
Broad shoulder’d, whence a ruddy yellow shone,
Distorted, and small-thigh’d; had eyes that saw
Out at their bosoms; twice four feet did draw
About their bodies; strong-neck’d, whence did rise
Two heads; nor could to any hand be prise;
They call them lobsters; that ate from the Mice
Their tails, their feet, and hands, and wrested all
Their lances from them, so that cold appall
The wretches put in rout, past all return.
And now the Fount of Light forbore to burn
Above the earth; when, which men’s laws commend,
Our battle in one day took absolute end.

THE END OF HOMER’S BATTLE OF FROGS AND MICE.

[1] Intending men: being divided from all other creatures by the voice; μέροψ, being a periphrasis, signifying voce divisus, of μείρω (μείρομαι) divido, and ὅψ, ὁπός, vox.

[2] Φυσίγναθος, Genas et buccas inflans.

[3] Πηλεύς, qui ex luto nascitur.

[4] ‘ϒδρομέδουνα. Aquarum regina.

[5] The river Po, in Italy.

[6] Ψιχάρπαξ. Gather-crum, or ravish-crum,

[7] Shear-crust.

[8] Lick-mill.

[9] Bacon-flitch-devourer, or gnawer.

[10] Τανύπεπλος. Extenso et prourisso peploamictus. A metaphor taken from ladies’ veils, or trains, and therefore their names are here added.

[11] ῞Ηπατα λευκοχίτωνα. Livering puddings white-skinn’d.

[12] Παντοδαποι̑σιν. Whose common exposition is only variis, when it properly signifies ex omni solo.

[13] Στονόεσσαν, of στενός, angutstus.

[14] Lickdish.

[15] Ευ͒ τ᾽ ἀσκήσαντες, ab ἀσκέω, elaboratè concinno.

[16] Enter-pot, or search-pot.

[17] Cheese-miner. Qui caseum rodendo cavat.

[18] Μιμούμενος. Aping, or imitating us.

[19] Boots of war.

[20] Στέμματα, Lanas, eo quod colus cingant seu coronent. Which our learned sect translate eating the crowns that Pallas wore.

[21] Τόκος. Partus, et id quod partu edidit mater. Metap. hic appellatur fænus quod ex usurâ ad nos redit.

[22] Κώνωψ. Culex vinarius.

[23] Loud-mouth.

[24] Kitchen-vessel licker.

[25] Hole-dweller. Qui foramina subit.

[26] Mud-born.

[27] Beet-devourer.

[28] The great bread eater.

[29] Πολύφωνον. The great-noise-maker, shrill or big-voiced.

[30] The lake-lover.

[31] Qui lambit culinaria vasa.

[32] Τιτύσκομαι intentissime dirigo ut certum ictum inferam.

[33] The cabbage-eater.

[34] Paludis incola. Lake-liver.

[35] Qui in calaminthâ, herbâ palustri, habitat.

[36] Bacon-eater.

[37] Qui aquis delectatur.

[38] Collop-devourer.

[39] Mud-sleeper.

[40] Leek or scallion lover.

[41] Kitchen-smell haunter, or hunter.

[42] Fenstalk.

[43] Qui per lutum it.

[44] Vociferator.

[45] Eat-corn.

[46] Scallion-devourer.

[47] Bread-betrayer.

[48] Scrap, or broken-meat-eater.

[49] Κρατερός, validus seu potens in retineudo.

[50] Νωτάκμονες. Incudes ferentes, or anvil-backed. ῞Ακμων. Incus, dicta per syncopen quasi nullis ictibus fatigetur.

[51] Ψαλίδοστομος. Forcipem in ore habens.

HYMNS

A Hymn to Apollo

I will remember and express the praise
Of heaven’s Far-darter, the fair King of days,
Whom even the Gods themselves fear when he goes
Through Jove’s high house; and when his goodly bows
He goes to bend, all from their thrones arise,
And cluster near, t’ admire his faculties.
Only Latona stirs not from her seat
Close by the Thund’rer, till her Son’s retreat
From his dread archery; but then she goes,
Slackens his string, and shuts his quiver close,
And (having taken to her hand his bow,
From off his able shoulders) doth bestow
Upon a pin of gold the glorious tiller,
The pin of gold fix’d in his father’s pillar.
Then doth She to his throne his state uphold,
Where his great Father, in a cup of gold,
Serves him with nectar, and shows all the grace
Of his great son. Then th’ other Gods take place;
His gracious mother glorying to bear
So great an archer, and a son so clear.
All hail, O blest Latona! to bring forth
An issue of such all-out-shining worth,
Royal Apollo, and the Queen that loves
The hurls of darts. She in th’ Ortygian groves,
And he in cliffy Delos, leaning on
The lofty Oros, and being built upon
By Cynthus’ prominent, that his head rears
Close to the palm that Inops’ fluent cheers.
How shall I praise thee, far being worthiest praise,
O Phœbus? To whose worth the law of lays
In all kinds is ascrib’d, if feeding flocks
By continent or isle. All eminent’st rocks
Did sing for joy, hill-tops, and floods in song
Did break their billows, as they flow’d along
To serve the sea; the shores, the seas, and all
Did sing as soon as from the lap did fall
Of blest Latona thee the joy of man.
Her child-bed made the mountain Cynthian
In rocky Delos, the sea-circled isle,
On whose all sides the black seas brake their pile,
And overflow’d for joy, so frank a gale
The singing winds did on their waves exhale.
Here born, all mortals live in thy commands,
Whoever Crete holds, Athens, or the strands
Of th’ isle Ægina, or the famous land
For ships (Eubœa), or Eresia,
Or Peparethus bord’ring on the sea,
Ægas, or Athos that doth Thrace divide
And Macedon; or Pelion, with the pride
Of his high forehead; or the Samian isle,
That likewise lies near Thrace; or Scyrus’ soil;
Ida’s steep tops; or all that Phocis fill;
Or Autocanes, with the heaven-high hill;
Or populous Imber; Lemnos without ports;
Or Lesbos, fit for the divine resorts;
And sacred soil of blest Æolion;
Or Chios that exceeds comparison
For fruitfulness; with all the isles that lie
Embrac’d with seas; Mimas, with rocks so high;
Or lofty-crown’d Corycius; or the bright
Charos; or Æsagæus’ dazzling height;
Or watery Samos; Mycale, that bears
Her brows even with the circles of the spheres;
Miletus; Cous, that the city is
Of voice-divided-choice humanities;
High Cnidus; Carpathus, still strook with wind;
Naxos, and Paros; and the rocky-min’d
Rugged Rhenæa. Yet through all these parts
Latona, great-grown with the King of darts,
Travell’d; and tried if any would become
To her dear birth an hospitable home.
All which extremely trembled, shook with fear,
Nor durst endure so high a birth to bear
In their free states, though, for it, they became
Never so fruitful; till the reverend Dame
Ascended Delos, and her soil did seize
With these wing’d words: “O Delos! Wouldst thou please
To be my son Apollo’s native seat,
And build a wealthy fane to one so great,
No one shall blame or question thy kind deed.
Nor think I, thou dost sheep or oxen feed
In any such store, or in vines exceed,
Nor bring’st forth such innumerable plants,
Which often make the rich inhabitants
Careless of Deity. If thou then shouldst rear
A fane to Phœbus, all men would confer
Whole hecatombs of beeves for sacrifice,
Still thronging hither; and to thee would rise
Ever unmeasur’d odours, shouldst thou long
Nourish thy King thus; and from foreign wrong
The Gods would guard thee; which thine own address
Can never compass for thy barrenness.”
She said, and Delos joy’d, replying thus:
“Most happy sister of Saturnius!
I gladly would with all means entertain
The King your son, being now despised of men,
But should be honour’d with the greatest then.
Yet this I fear, nor will conceal from thee:
Your son, some say, will author misery
In many kinds, as being to sustain
A mighty empire over Gods and men,
Upon the holy-gift-giver the Earth.
And bitterly I fear that, when his birth
Gives him the sight of my so barren soil,
He will contemn, and give me up to spoil,
Enforce the sea to me, that ever will
Oppress my heart with many a wat’ry hill.
And therefore let him choose some other land,
Where he shall please, to build at his command
Temple and grove, set thick with many a tree.
For wretched polypuses breed in me
Retiring chambers, and black sea-calves den
In my poor soil, for penury of men.
And yet, O Goddess, wouldst thou please to swear
The Gods’ great oath to me, before thou bear
Thy blessed son here, that thou wilt erect
A fane to him, to render the effect
Of men’s demands to them before they fall,
Then will thy son’s renown be general,
Men will his name in such variety call,
And I shall then be glad his birth to bear.”
This said, the Gods’ great oath she thus did swear:
“Know this, O Earth! broad heaven’s inferior sphere,
And of black Styx the most infernal lake,
(Which is the gravest oath the Gods can take)
That here shall ever rise to Phœbus’ name
An odorous fane and altar; and thy fame
Honour, past all isles else, shall see him employ’d.”
Her oath thus took and ended, Delos joy’d
in mighty measure that she should become
To far-shot Phœbus’ birth the famous home.
Latona then nine days and nights did fall
In hopeless labour; at whose birth were all
Heaven’s most supreme and worthy Goddesses,
Dione, Rhæa, and th’ Exploratress
Themis, and Amphitrite that will be
Pursu’d with sighs still; every Deity,
Except the snowy-wristed wife of Jove,
Who held her moods aloft, and would not move;
Only Lucina (to whose virtue vows
Each childbirth patient) heard not of her throes,
But sat, by Juno’s counsel, on the brows
Of broad Olympus, wrapp’d in clouds of gold.
Whom Jove’s proud wife in envy did withhold,
Because bright-lock’d Latona was to bear
A son so faultless and in force so clear.
The rest Thaumantia sent before, to bring
Lucina to release the envied king,
Assuring her, that they would straight confer
A carcanet, nine cubits long, on her,
All woven with wires of gold. But charg’d her, then,
To call apart from th’ ivory-wristed Queen
The childbirth-guiding Goddess, for just fear
Lest, her charge utter’d in Saturnia’s ear,
She, after, might dissuade her from descent.
When wind-swift-footed Iris knew th’ intent
Of th’ other Goddesses, away she went,
And instantly she pass’d the infinite space
’Twixt earth and heaven; when, coming to the place
Where dwelt th’ Immortals, straight without the gate
She gat Lucina, and did all relate
The Goddesses commanded, and inclin’d
To all that they demanded her dear mind.
And on their way they went, like those two doves
That, walking highways, every shadow moves
Up from the earth, forc’d with their natural fear.
When ent’ring Delos, She, that is so dear
To dames in labour, made Latona straight
Prone to delivery, and to wield the weight
Of her dear burthen with a world of ease.
When, with her fair hand, she a palm did seize,
And, staying her by it, stuck her tender knees
Amidst the soft mead, that did smile beneath
Her sacred labour; and the child did breathe
The air in th’ instant. All the Goddesses
Brake in kind tears and shrieks for her quick ease,
And thee, O archer Phœbus, with waves clear
Wash’d sweetly over, swaddled with sincere
And spotless swathbands; and made then to flow
About thy breast a mantle, white as snow,
Fine, and new made; and cast a veil of gold
Over thy forehead. Nor yet forth did hold
Thy mother for thy food her golden breast,
But Themis, in supply of it, address’d
Lovely Ambrosia, and drunk off to thee
A bowl of nectar, interchangeably
With her immortal fingers serving thine.
And when, O Phœbus, that eternal wine
Thy taste had relish’d, and that food divine,
No golden swathband longer could contain
Thy panting bosom; all that would constrain
Thy soon-eas’d Godhead, every feeble chain
Of earthy child-rites, flew in sunder all.
And then didst thou thus to the Deities call:
“Let there be given me my lov’d lute and bow,
I’ll prophesy to men, and make them know
Jove’s perfect counsels.” This said, up did fly
From broad-way’d Earth the unshorn Deity,
Far-shot Apollo. All th’ Immortals stood
In steep amaze to see Latona’s brood.
All Delos, looking on him, all with gold
Was loaden straight, and joy’d to be extoll’d
By great Latona so, that she decreed
Her barrenness should bear the fruitful’st seed
Of all the isles and continents of earth,
And lov’d her from her heart so for her birth.
For so she flourish’d, as a hill that stood
Crown’d with the flow’r of an abundant wood.
And thou, O Phœbus, bearing in thy hand
Thy silver bow, walk’st over every land,
Sometimes ascend’st the rough-hewn rocky hill
Of desolate Cynthus, and sometimes tak’st will
To visit islands, and the plumps of men.
And many a temple, all ways, men ordain
To thy bright Godhead; groves, made dark with trees,
And never shorn, to hide the Deities,
All high-lov’d prospects, all the steepest brows
Of far-seen hills, and every flood that flows
Forth to the sea, are dedicate to thee.
But most of all thy mind’s alacrity
Is rais’d with Delos; since, to fill thy fane,
There flocks so many an Ionian,
With ample gowns that flow down to their feet,
With all their children, and the reverend sweet
Of all their pious wives. And these are they
That (mindful of thee) even thy Deity
Render more spritely with their champion fight,
Dances, and songs, perform’d to glorious sight,
Once having publish’d, and proclaim’d their strife.
And these are acted with such exquisite life
That one would say, “Now, the Ionian strains
Are turn’d Immortals, nor know what age means.”
His mind would take such pleasure from his eye,
To see them serv’d by all mortality,
Their men so human, women so well grac’d,
Their ships so swift, their riches so increas’d,
Since thy observance, who, being all before
Thy opposites, were all despis’d and poor.
And to all these this absolute wonder add,
Whose praise shall render all posterities glad:
The Delian virgins are thy handmaids all,
And, since they serv’d Apollo, jointly fall
Before Latona, and Diana too,
In sacred service, and do therefore know
How to make mention of the ancient trims
Of men and women, in their well-made hymns,
And soften barbarous nations with their songs,
Being able all to speak the several tongues
Of foreign nations, and to imitate
Their musics there, with art so fortunate
That one would say, there everyone did speak,
And all their tunes in natural accents break,
Their songs so well compos’d are, and their art
To answer all sounds is of such desert.
But come, Latona, and thou King of flames,
With Phœbe, rect’ress of chaste thoughts in dames
Let me salute ye, and your graces call
Hereafter to my just memorial.
And you, O Delian virgins, do me grace,
When any stranger of our earthy race,
Whose restless life affliction hath in chace,
Shall hither come and question you, who is,
To your chaste ears, of choicest faculties
In sacred poesy, and with most right
Is author of your absolut’st delight,
Ye shall yourselves do all the right ye can
To answer for our name:—“The sightless man
Of stony Chios. All whose poems shall
In all last ages stand for capital.”
This for your own sakes I desire, for I
Will propagate mine own precedency
As far as earth shall well-built cities bear,
Or human conversation is held dear,
Not with my praise direct, but praises due,
And men shall credit it, because ’tis true.
However, I’ll not cease the praise I vow
To far-shot Phœbus with the silver bow,
Whom lovely-hair’d Latona gave the light.
O King! both Lycia is in rule thy right,
Fair Mœony, and the maritimal
Miletus, wish’d to be the seat of all.
But chiefly Delos, girt with billows round,
Thy most respected empire doth resound.
Where thou to Pythus went’st, to answer there,
As soon as thou wert born, the burning ear
Of many a far-come, to hear future deeds,
Clad in divine and odoriferous weeds,
And with thy golden fescue play’dst upon
Thy hollow harp, that sounds to heaven set gone.
Then to Olympus swift as thought he flew,
To Jove’s high house, and had a retinue
Of Gods t’ attend him; and then straight did fall
To study of the harp, and harpsical,
All th’ Immortals. To whom every Muse
With ravishing voices did their answers use,
Singing th’ eternal deeds of Deity,
And from their hands what hells of misery
Poor humans suffer, living desperate quite,
And not an art they have, wit, or deceit,
Can make them manage any act aright,
Nor find, with all the soul they can engage,
A salve for death, or remedy for age.
But here the fair-hair’d Graces, the wise Hours,
Harmonia, Hebe, and sweet Venus’ pow’rs,
Danc’d, and each other’s palm to palm did cling.
And with these danc’d not a deformed thing,
No forespoke dwarf, nor downward witherling,
But all with wond’rous goodly forms were deckt,
And mov’d with beauties of unpriz’d aspect.
Dart-dear Diana, even with Phœbus bred,
Danc’d likewise there; and Mars a march did tread
With that brave bevy. In whose consort fell
Argicides, th’ ingenious sentinel.
Phœbus-Apollo touch’d his lute to them
Sweetly and softly, a most glorious beam
Casting about him, as he danc’d and play’d,
And even his feet were all with rays array’d;
His weed and all of a most curious trim
With no less lustre grac’d and circled him.
By these Latona, with a hair that shin’d
Like burnish’d gold, and, with the mighty mind;
Heaven’s counsellor, Jove, sat with delightsome eyes;
To see their son new rank’d with Deities.
How shall I praise thee, then, that art all praise?
Amongst the brides shall I thy Deity raise?
Or being in love, when sad thou went’st to woo
The virgin Aza, and didst overthrow
The even-with-Gods, Elation’s mighty seed,
That had of goodly horse so brave a breed,
And Phorbas, son of sovereign Triopus,
Valiant Leucippus, and Ereutheus,
And Triopus himself with equal fall,
Thou but on foot, and they on horseback all?
Or shall I sing thee, as thou first didst grace
Earth with thy foot, to find thee forth a place
Fit to pronounce thy oracles to men?
First from Olympus thou alightedst then
Into Pieria, passing all the land
Of fruitless Lesbos, chok’d with drifts of sand,
The Magnets likewise, and the Perrhæbes;
And to Iolcus variedst thy access,
Cenæus’ tops ascending, that their base
Make bright Eubœa, being of ships the grace,
And fix’d thy fair stand in Lelantus’ field,
That did not yet thy mind’s contentment yield
To raise a fane on, and a sacred grove.
Passing Euripus then, thou mad’st remove
Up to earth’s ever-green and holiest hill.
Yet swiftly thence, too, thou transcendedst still
To Mycalessus, and didst touch upon
Teumessus, apt to make green couches on,
And flowery field-beds. Then thy progress found
Thebes out, whose soil with only woods was crown’d,
For yet was sacred Thebes no human seat,
And therefore were no paths nor highways beat
On her free bosom, that flows now with wheat,
But then she only wore on it a wood.
From hence (even loth to part, because it stood
Fit for thy service) thou putt’st on remove
To green Onchestus, Neptune’s glorious grove,
Where new-tam’d horse, bred, nourish nerves so rare
That still they frolic, though they travell’d are
Never so sore, and hurry after them
Most heavy coaches, but are so extreme
(In usual travel) fiery and free,
That though their coachman ne’er so masterly
Governs their courages, he sometimes must
Forsake his seat, and give their spirits their lust,
When after them their empty coach they draw,
Foaming, and neighing, quite exempt from awe.
And if their coachman guide through any grove
Unshorn, and vow’d to any Deity’s love,
The lords encoach’d leap out, and all their care
Use to allay their fires, with speaking fair
Stroking and trimming them, and in some queach,
Or strength of shade, within their nearest reach,
Reining them up, invoke the deified King
Of that unshorn and everlasting spring,
And leave them then to her preserving hands,
Who is the Fate that there the God commands.
And this was first the sacred fashion there.
From hence thou went’st, O thou in shafts past peer,
And found’st Cephissus with thy all-seeing beams,
Whose flood affects so many silver streams,
And from Lilæus pours so bright a wave.
Yet forth thy foot flew, and thy fair eyes gave
The view of Ocale the rich in tow’rs;
Then to Amartus that abounds in flow’rs,
Then to Delphusa putt’st thy progress on,
Whose blessed soil nought harmful breeds upon;
And there thy pleasure would a fane adorn,
And nourish woods whose shades should ne’er be shorn.
Where this thou told’st her, standing to her close:
“Delphusa, here I entertain suppose
To build a far-fam’d temple, and ordain
An oracle t’ inform the minds of men,
Who shall for ever offer to my love
Whole hecatombs; even all the men that move
In rich Peloponnesus, and all those
Of Europe, and the isles the seas enclose,
Whom future search of acts and beings brings.
To whom I’ll prophesy the truths of things
In that rich temple where my oracle sings.”
This said, the All-bounds-reacher, with his bow,
The fane’s divine foundations did foreshow;
Ample they were, and did huge length impart,
With a continuate tenour, full of art.
But when Delphusa look’d into his end,
Her heart grew angry, and did thus extend
Itself to Phœbus: “Phœbus, since thy mind
A far-fam’d fane hath in itself design’d
To bear an oracle to men in me,
That hecatombs may put in fire to thee,
This let me tell thee, and impose for stay
Upon thy purpose: Th’ inarticulate neigh
Of fire-hov’d horse will ever disobey
Thy numerous ear, and mules will for their drink
Trouble my sacred springs, and I should think
That any of the human race had rather
See here the hurries of rich coaches gather,
And hear the haughty neighs of swift-hov’d horse,
Than in his pleasure’s place convert recourse
T’a mighty temple; and his wealth bestow
On pieties, where his sports may freely flow,
Or see huge wealth that he shall never owe.
And, therefore, wouldst thou hear my free advice,—
Though mightier far thou art, and much more wise,
O king, than I, thy pow’r being great’st of all
In Crissa, underneath the bosom’s fall
Of steep Parnassus,—let thy mind be given
To set thee up a fane, where never driven
Shall glorious coaches be, nor horses’ neighs
Storm near thy well-built altars, but thy praise
Let the fair race of pious humans bring
Into thy fane, that Io-pæans sing.
And those gifts only let thy deified mind
Be circularly pleas’d with, being the kind
And fair burnt-offerings that true Deities bind.”
With this his mind she altered, though she spake
Not for his good, but her own glory’s sake.
From hence, O Phœbus, first thou mad’st retreat,
And of the Phlegians reached the walled seat,
Inhabited with contumelious men,
Who, slighting Jove, took up their dwellings then
Within a large cave, near Cephissus’ lake.
Hence, swiftly moving, thou all speed didst make
Up to the tops intended, and the ground
Of Crissa, under the-with-snow-still-crown’d
Parnassus, reach’d, whose face affects the West;
Above which hangs a rock, that still seems prest
To fall upon it, through whose breast doth run
A rocky cave, near which the King the Sun
Cast to contrive a temple to his mind,
And said, “Now here stands my conceit inclin’d
To build a famous fane, where still shall be
An oracle to men, that still to me
Shall offer absolute hecatombs, as well
Those that in rich Peloponnesus dwell
As those of Europe, and the isles that lie
Wall’d with the sea, that all their pains apply
T’ employ my counsels. To all which will I
True secrets tell, by way of prophecy,
In my rich temple, that shall ever be
An oracle to all posterity.”
This said, the fane’s form he did straight present,
Ample, and of a length of great extent;
In which Trophonius and Agamede,
Who of Erginus were the famous seed,
Impos’d the stony entry, and the heart
Of every God had for their excellent art.
About the temple dwelt of human name
Unnumber’d nations, it acquired such fame,
Being all of stone, built for eternal date.
And near it did a fountain propagate
A fair stream far away; when Jove’s bright seed,
The King Apollo, with an arrow, freed
From his strong string, destroy’d the Dragoness
That wonder nourish’d, being of such excess
In size, and horridness of monstrous shape,
That on the forc’d earth she wrought many a rape,
Many a spoil made on it, many an ill
On crook-haunch’d herds brought, being impurpled still
With blood of all sorts; having undergone
The charge of Juno, with the golden throne,
To nourish Typhon, the abhorr’d affright
And bane of mortals, whom into the light
Saturnia brought forth, being incensed with Jove,
Because the most renown’d fruit of his love
(Pallas) he got, and shook out of his brain.
For which majestic Juno did complain
In this kind to the Bless’d Court of the skies:
“Know all ye sex-distinguish’d Deities,
That Jove, assembler of the cloudy throng,
Begins with me first, and affects with wrong
My right in him, made by himself his wife,
That knows and does the honour’d marriage life
All honest offices; and yet hath he
Unduly got, without my company,
Blue-eyed Minerva, who of all the sky
Of blest Immortals is the absolute grace;
Where I have brought into the Heavenly Race
A son, both taken in his feet and head,
So ugly, and so far from worth my bed,
That, ravish’d into hand, I took and threw
Down to the vast sea his detested view;
Where Nereus’ daughter, Thetis, who her way
With silver feet makes, and the fair array
Of her bright sisters, saved, and took to guard.
But, would to heaven, another yet were spared
The like grace of his godhead! Crafty mate,
What other scape canst thou excogitate?
How could thy heart sustain to get alone
The grey-eyed Goddess? Her conception
Nor bringing forth had any hand of mine,
And yet, know all the Gods, I go for thine
To such kind uses. But I’ll now employ
My brain to procreate a masculine joy,
That ’mongst th’ Immortals may as eminent shine,
With shame affecting nor my bed nor thine.
Nor will I ever touch at thine again,
But far fly it and thee; and yet will reign
Amongst th’ Immortals ever.” This spleen spent
(Still yet left angry) far away she went
From all the Deathless, and yet pray’d to all,
Advanced her hand, and, ere she let it fall,
Used these excitements: “Hear me now, O Earth!
Broad Heaven above it, and beneath, your birth,
The deified Titanois, that dwell about
Vast Tartarus, from whence sprung all the rout
Of Men and Deities! Hear me all, I say,
With all your forces, and give instant way
T’ a son of mine without Jove, who yet may
Nothing inferior prove in force to him,
But past him spring as far in able limb
As he past Saturn.” This pronounced, she strook
Life-bearing Earth so strongly, that she shook
Beneath her numb’d hand. Which when she beheld,
Her bosom with abundant comforts swell’d,
In hope all should to her desire extend.
From hence the year, that all such proofs gives end,
Grew round; yet all that time the bed of Jove
She never touch’d at, never was her love
Enflam’d to sit near his Dædalian throne,
As she accustomed, to consult upon
Counsels kept dark with many a secret skill,
But kept her vow-frequented temple still,
Pleas’d with her sacrifice; till now, the nights
And days accomplish’d, and the year’s whole rights
In all her revolutions being expired,
The hours and all run out that were required
To vent a birth-right, she brought forth a son,
Like Gods or men in no condition,
But a most dreadful and pernicious thing,
Call’d Typhon, who on all the human spring
Conferr’d confusion. Which received to hand
By Juno, instantly she gave command
(Ill to ill adding) that the Dragoness
Should bring it up; who took, and did oppress
With many a misery (to maintain th’ excess
Of that inhuman monster) all the race
Of men that were of all the world the grace,
Till the far-working Phœbus at her sent
A fiery arrow, that invoked event
Of death gave to her execrable life.
Before which yet she lay in bitter strife,
With dying pains, grovelling on earth, and drew
Extreme short respirations; for which flew
A shout about the air, whence no man knew,
But came by power divine. And then she lay
Tumbling her trunk, and winding every way
About her nasty nest, quite leaving then
Her murderous life, embrued with deaths of men.
Then Phœbus gloried, saying: “Thyself now lie
On men-sustaining earth, and putrefy,
Who first of putrefaction was inform’d.
Now on thy life have death’s cold vapours storm’d,
That storm’dst on men the earth-fed so much death,
In envy of the offspring they made breathe
Their lives out on my altars. Now from thee
Not Typhon shall enforce the misery
Of merited death, nor She, whose name implies
Such scathe (Chimæra), but black earth make prise
To putrefaction thy immanities,
And bright Hyperion, that light all eyes shows,
Thine with a night of rottenness shall close.”
Thus spake he glorying. And then seiz’d upon
Her horrid heap, with putrefaction,
Hyperion’s lovely pow’rs; from whence her name
Took sound of Python, and heaven’s Sovereign Flame
Was surnam’d Pythius, since the sharp-eyed Sun
Affected so with putrefaction
The hellish monster. And now Phœbus’ mind
Gave him to know that falsehood had strook blind
Even his bright eye, because it could not find
The subtle Fountain’s fraud; to whom he flew,
Enflamed with anger, and in th’ instant drew
Close to Delphusa, using this short vow:
“Delphusa! You must look no longer now
To vent your frauds on me; for well I know
Your situation to be lovely, worth
A temple’s imposition, it pours forth
So delicate a stream. But your renown
Shall now no longer shine here, but mine own.”
This said, he thrust her promontory down,
And damm’d her fountain up with mighty stones,
A temple giving consecrations
In woods adjoining. And in this fane all
On him, by surname of Delphusius, call,
Because Delphusa’s sacred flood and fame
His wrath affected so, and hid in shame.
And then thought Phœbus what descent of men
To be his ministers he should retain,
To do in stony Pythos sacrifice.
To which his mind contending, his quick eyes
He cast upon the blue sea, and beheld
A ship, on whose masts sails that wing’d it swell’d,
In which were men transferr’d, many and good,
That in Minoian Cnossus ate their food,
And were Cretensians; who now are those
That all the sacrificing dues dispose,
And all the laws deliver to a word
Of Day’s great King, that wears the golden sword,
And oracles (out of his Delphian tree
That shrouds her fair arms in the cavity
Beneath Parnassus’ mount) pronounce to men.
These now his priests, that lived as merchants then,
In traffics and pecuniary rates,
For sandy Pylos and the Pylian states.
Were under sail. But now encounter’d them
Phœbus-Apollo, who into the stream
Cast himself headlong, and the strange disguise
Took of a dolphin of a goodly size.
Like which he leap’d into their ship, and lay
As an ostent of infinite dismay.
For none with any strife of mind could look
Into the omen, all the ship-masts shook,
And silent all sat with the fear they took,
Arm’d not, nor strook they sail, but as before
Went on with full trim, and a foreright blore,
Stiff, and from forth the south, the ship made fly.
When first they stripp’d the Malean promont’ry,
Touch’d at Laconia’s soil, in which a town
Their ship arriv’d at, that the sea doth crown,
Called Tenarus, a place of much delight
To men that serve Heaven’s Comforter of sight.
In which are fed the famous flocks that bear
The wealthy fleeces, on a delicate lair
Being fed and seated. Where the merchants fain
Would have put in, that they might out again
To tell the miracle that chanced to them,
And try if it would take the sacred stream,
Rushing far forth, that he again might bear
Those other fishes that abounded there
Delightsome company, or still would stay
Aboard their dry ship. But it fail’d t’ obey,
And for the rich Peloponnesian shore
Steer’d her free sail; Apollo made the blore
Directly guide it. That obeying still
Reach’d dry Arena, and (what wish doth fill)
Fair Argyphæa, and the populous height
Of Thryus, whose stream, siding her, doth wait
With safe pass on Alphæus, Pylos’ sands,
And Pylian dwellers; keeping by the strands
On which th’ inhabitants of Crunius dwell,
And Helida set opposite to hell;
Chalcis and Dymes reach’d, and happily
Made sail by Pheras; all being overjoy’d
With that frank gale that Jove himself employ’d.
And then amongst the clouds they might descry
The hill, that far-seen Ithaca calls her Eye,
Dulichius, Samos, and, with timber graced,
Shady Zacynthus. But when now they past
Peloponnesus all, and then when show’d
The infinite vale of Crissa, that doth shroud
All rich Morea with her liberal breast,
So frank a gale there flew out of the West
As all the sky discover’d; ’twas so great,
And blew so from the very council seat
Of Jove himself, that quickly it might send
The ship through full seas to her journey’s end.
From thence they sail’d, quite opposite, to the East,
And to the region where Light leaves his rest,
The Light himself being sacred pilot there,
And made the sea-trod ship arrive them near
The grapeful Crissa, where he rest doth take
Close to her port and sands. And then forth brake
The far-shot King, like to a star that strows
His glorious forehead where the mid-day glows,
That all in sparkles did his state attire,
Whose lustre leap’d up to the sphere of fire.
He trod where no way oped, and pierced the place
That of his sacred tripods held the grace,
In which he lighted such a fluent flame
As gilt all Crissa; in which every dame,
And dame’s fair daughter, cast out vehement cries
At those fell fires of Phœbus’ prodigies,
That shaking fears through all their fancies threw.
Then, like the mind’s swift light, again he flew
Back to the ship, shaped like a youth in height
Of all his graces, shoulders broad and straight,
And all his hair in golden curls enwrapp’d;
And to the merchants thus his speech he shap’d:
“Ho! Strangers! What are you? And from what seat
Sail ye these ways that salt and water sweat?
To traffic justly? Or use vagrant scapes
Void of all rule, conferring wrongs and rapes,
Like pirates, on the men ye never saw,
With minds project exempt from list or law?
Why sit ye here so stupefied, nor take
Land while ye may, nor deposition make
Of naval arms, when this the fashion is
Of men industrious, who (their faculties
Wearied at sea) leave ship, and use the land
For food, that with their healths and stomachs stand?”
This said, with bold minds he their breast supplied,
And thus made answer the Cretensian guide:
“Stranger! Because you seem to us no seed
Of any mortal, but celestial breed
For parts and person, joy your steps ensue,
And Gods make good the bliss we think your due.
Vouchsafe us true relation, on what land
We here arrive, and what men here command.
We were for well-known parts bound, and from Crete
(Our vaunted country) to the Pylian seat
Vow’d our whole voyage; yet arrive we here,
Quite cross to those wills that our motions steer,
Wishing to make return some other way,
Some other course desirous to assay,
To pay our lost pains. But some God hath fill’d
Our frustrate sails, defeating what we will’d.”
Apollo answer’d: “Strangers! Though before
Ye dwelt in woody Cnossus, yet no more
Ye must be made your own reciprocals
To your loved city and fair severals
Of wives and houses, but ye shall have here
My wealthy temple, honour’d far and near
Of many a nation; for myself am son
To Jove himself, and of Apollo won
The glorious title, who thus safely through
The sea’s vast billows still have held your plough,
No ill intending, that will yet ye make
My temple here your own, and honours take
Upon yourselves, all that to me are given.
And more, the counsels of the King of Heaven
Yourselves shall know, and with his will receive
Ever the honours that all men shall give.
Do as I say then instantly, strike sail,
Take down your tackling, and your vessel hale
Up into land; your goods bring forth, and all
The instruments that into sailing fall;
Make on this shore an altar, fire enflame,
And barley white cakes offer to my name;
And then, environing the altar, pray,
And call me (as ye saw me in the day
When from the windy seas I brake swift way
Into your ship) Delphinius, since I took
A dolphin’s form then. And to every look
That there shall seek it, that my altar shall
Be made a Delphian memorial
From thence for ever. After this, ascend
Your swift black ship and sup, and then intend
Ingenuous offerings to the equal Gods
That in celestial seats make blest abodes.
When, having stay’d your healthful hunger’s sting,
Come all with me, and Io-pæans sing
All the way’s length, till you attain the state
Where I your opulent fane have consecrate.”
To this they gave him passing diligent ear,
And vow’d to his obedience all they were.
First, striking sail, their tacklings then they losed,
And (with their gables stoop’d) their mast imposed
Into the mast-room. Forth themselves then went,
And from the sea into the continent
Drew up their ship; which far up from the sand
They rais’d with ample rafters. Then in hand
They took the altar; and inform’d it on
The sea’s near shore, imposing thereupon
White cakes of barley, fire made, and did stand
About it round, as Phœbus gave command,
Submitting invocations to his will.
Then sacrific’d to all the heavenly hill
Of pow’rful Godheads. After which they eat
Aboard their ship, till with fit food replete
They rose, nor to their temple used delay.
Whom Phœbus usher’d, and touch’d all the way
His heavenly lute with art above admired,
Gracefully leading them. When all were fired
With zeal to him, and follow’d wond’ring all
To Pythos; and upon his name did call
With Io-pæans, such as Cretans use.
And in their bosoms did the deified Muse
Voices of honey-harmony infuse.
With never-weary feet their way they went,
And made with all alacrity ascent
Up to Parnassus, and that long’d-for place
Where they should live, and be of men the grace.
When, all the way, Apollo show’d them still
Their far-stretch’d valleys, and their two-topp’d hill,
Their famous fane, and all that all could raise
To a supreme height of their joy and praise.
And then the Cretan captain thus inquired
Of King Apollo: “Since you have retired,
O sovereign, our sad lives so far from friends
And native soil (because so far extends
Your dear mind’s pleasure) tell us how we shall
Live in your service? To which question call
Our provident minds, because we see not crown’d
This soil with store of vines, nor doth abound
In wealthy meadows, on which we may live,
As well as on men our attendance give.”
He smiled, and said: “O men that nothing know,
And so are follow’d with a world of woe,
That needs will succour care and curious moan,
And pour out sighs without cessation,
Were all the riches of the earth your own!
Without much business, I will render known
To your simplicities an easy way
To wealth enough, Let every man purvey
A skeane, or slaught’ring steel, and his right hand,
Bravely bestowing, evermore see mann’d
With killing sheep, that to my fane will flow
From all far nations. On all which bestow
Good observation, and all else they give
To me make you your own all, and so live.
For all which watch before my temple well,
And all my counsels, above all, conceal.
If any give vain language, or to deeds,
Yea or as far as injury, proceeds,
Know that, at losers’ hands, for those that gain,
It is the law of mortals to sustain.
Besides, ye shall have princes to obey,
Which still ye must, and (so ye gain) ye may.
All now is said; give all thy memory’s stay.”
And thus to thee, Jove and Latona’s son,
Be given all grace of salutation!
Both thee and others of th’ Immortal State
My song shall memorize to endless date.

THE END OF THE HYMN TO APOLLO.

A Hymn to Hermes

Hermes, the son of Jove and Maia, sing,
O Muse, th’ Arcadian and Cyllenian king,
They rich in flocks, he heaven enriching still
In messages return’d with all his will.
Whom glorious Maia, the nymph rich in hair,
Mixing with Jove in amorous affair,
Brought forth to him, sustaining a retreat
From all th’ Immortals of the blessed seat,
And living in the same dark cave, where Jove
Inform’d at midnight the effect of love,
Unknown to either man or Deity,
Sweet sleep once having seized the jealous eye
Of Juno deck’d with wrists of ivory.
But when great Jove’s high mind was consummate,
The tenth month had in heaven confined the date
Of Maia’s labour, and into the sight
She brought in one birth labours infinite;
For then she bore a son, that all tried ways
Could turn and wind to wish’d events assays,
A fair-tongu’d, but false-hearted, counsellor,
Rector of ox-stealers, and for all stealths bore
A varied finger; speeder of night’s spies,
And guide of all her dreams’ obscurities;
Guard of door-guardians; and was born to be,
Amongst th’ Immortals, that wing’d Deity
That in an instant should do acts would ask
The powers of others an eternal task.
Born in the morn, he form’d his lute at noon,
At night stole all the oxen of the Sun;
And all this in his birth’s first day was done,
Which was the fourth of the increasing moon.
Because celestial limbs sustain’d his strains,
His sacred swath-bands must not be his chains,
So, starting up, to Phœbus’ herd he stept,
Found straight the high-roof’d cave where they were kept,
And th’ entry passing, he th’ invention found
Of making lutes; and did in wealth abound
By that invention, since he first of all
Was author of that engine musical,
By this means moved to the ingenious work:
Near the cave’s inmost overture did lurk
A tortoise, tasting th’ odoriferous grass,
Leisurely moving; and this object was
The motive to Jove’s son (who could convert
To profitable uses all desert
That nature had in any work convey’d)
To form the lute; when, smiling, thus he said:
“Thou mov’st in me a note of excellent use,
Which thy ill form shall never so seduce
T’ avert the good to be inform’d by it,
In pliant force, of my form-forging wit.”
Then the slow tortoise, wrought on by his mind,
He thus saluted: “All joy to the kind
Instinct of nature in thee, born to be
The spiriter of dances, company
For feasts, and following banquets, graced and blest
For bearing light to all the interest
Claim’d in this instrument! From whence shall spring
Play fair and sweet, to which may Graces sing.
A pretty painted coat thou putt’st on here,
O Tortoise, while thy ill-bred vital sphere
Confines thy fashion; but, surprised by me,
I’ll bear thee home, where thou shalt ever be
A profit to me; and yet nothing more
Will I contemn thee in my merited store.
Goods with good parts got worth and honour gave,
Left goods and honours every fool may have,
And since thou first shall give me means to live,
I’ll love thee ever. Virtuous qualities give
To live at home with them enough content,
Where those that want such inward ornament
Fly out for outward, their life made their load.
Tis best to be at home, harm lurks abroad.
And certainly thy virtue shall be known,
’Gainst great-ill-causing incantation
To serve as for a lance or amulet.
And where, in comfort of thy vital heat,
Thou now breath’st but a sound confus’d for song,
Expos’d by nature, after death, more strong
Thou shalt in sounds of art be, and command
Song infinite sweeter.” Thus with either hand
He took it up, and instantly took flight
Back to his cave with that his home delight.
Where (giving to the mountain tortoise vents
Of life and motion) with fit instruments
Forged of bright steel he straight inform’d a lute,
Put neck and frets to it, of which a suit
He made of splitted quills, in equal space
Impos’d upon the neck, and did embrace
Both back and bosom. At whose height (as gins
T’ extend and ease the string) he put in pins.
Seven strings of several tunes he then applied,
Made of the entrails of a sheep well-dried,
And throughly twisted. Next he did provide
A case for all, made of an ox’s hide,
Out of his counsels to preserve as well
As to create. And all this action fell
Into an instant consequence. His word
And work had individual accord,
All being as swiftly to perfection brought
As any worldly man’s most ravish’d thought,
Whose mind care cuts in an infinity
Of varied parts or passions instantly,
Or as the frequent twinklings of an eye.
And thus his house-delight given absolute end,
He touch’d it, and did every string extend
(With an exploratory spirit assay’d)
To all the parts that could on it be play’d.
It sounded dreadfully; to which he sung,
As if from thence the first and true force sprung
That fashions virtue. God in him did sing.
His play was likewise an unspeakable thing,
Yet, but as an extemporal assay,
Of what show it would make being the first way,
It tried his hand; or a tumultuous noise,
Such as at feasts the first-flower’d spirits of boys
Pour out in mutual contumelies still,
As little squaring with his curious will,
Or was as wanton and untaught a store.
Of Jove, and Maia that rich shoes still wore,
He sung; who suffer’d ill reports before,
And foul stains under her fair titles bore.
But Hermes sung her nation, and her name
Did iterate ever; all her high-flown fame
Of being Jove’s mistress; celebrating all
Her train of servants, and collateral
Sumpture of houses; all her tripods there,
And caldrons huge, increasing every year.
All which she knew, yet felt her knowledge stung
With her fame’s loss, which (found) she more wish’d sung.
But now he in his sacred cradle laid
His lute so absolute, and straight convey’d
Himself up to a watch-tow’r forth his house,
Rich, and divinely odoriferous,
A lofty wile at work in his conceit,
Thirsting the practice of his empire’s height.
And where impostors rule (since sable night
Must serve their deeds) he did his deeds their right.
For now the never-resting Sun was turn’d
For th’ under earth, and in the ocean burn’d
His coach and coursers; when th’ ingenious spy
Pieria’s shady hill had in his eye,
Where the immortal oxen of the Gods
In air’s flood solaced their select abodes,
And earth’s sweet green flow’r, that was never shorn,
Fed ever down. And these the witty-born,
Argicides, set serious spy upon,
Severing from all the rest, and setting gone
Full fifty of the violent bellowers.
Which driving through the sands, he did reverse
(His birth’s-craft straight rememb’ring) all their hoves,
And them transpos’d in opposite removes,
The fore behind set, the behind before,
T’ employ the eyes of such as should explore.
And he himself, as sly-pac’d, cast away
His sandals on the sea sands; past display
And unexcogitable thoughts in act
Putting, to shun of his stol’n steps the tract,
Mixing both tamrisk and like-tamrisk sprays
In a most rare confusion, to raise
His footsteps up from earth. Of which sprays he
(His armful gathering fresh from off the tree)
Made for his sandals ties, both leaves and ties
Holding together; and then fear’d no eyes
That could affect his feet’s discoveries.
The tamrisk boughs he gather’d, making way
Back from Pieria, but as to convey
Provision in them for his journey fit,
It being long and, therefore, needing it.
An old man, now at labour near the field
Of green Onchestus, knew the verdant yield
Of his fair armful; whom th’ ingenious son
Of Maia, therefore, salutation
Did thus begin to: “Ho, old man! that now
Art crooked grown with making plants to grow,
Thy nerves will far be spent, when these boughs shall
To these their leaves confer me fruit and all.
But see not thou whatever thou dost see,
Nor hear though hear, but all as touching me
Conceal, since nought it can endamage thee.”
This, and no more, he said, and on drave still
His broad-brow’d oxen. Many a shady hill,
And many an echoing valley, many a field
Pleasant and wishful, did his passage yield
Their safe transcension. But now the divine
And black-brow’d Night, his mistress, did decline
Exceeding swiftly; Day’s most early light
Fast hasting to her first point, to excite
Worldlings to work; and in her watch-tow’r shone
King Pallas-Megamedes’ seed (the Moon);
When through th’ Alphæan flood Jove’s powerful son
Phœbus-Apollo’s ample-foreheaded herd
(Whose necks the lab’ring yoke had never sphered)
Drave swiftly on; and then into a stall
(Hilly, yet pass’d to through an humble vale
And hollow dells, in a most lovely mead)
He gather’d all, and them divinely fed
With odorous cypress, and the ravishing tree
That makes his eaters lose the memory
Of name and country. Then he brought withal
Much wood, whose sight into his search let fall
The art of making fire; which thus he tried:
He took a branch of laurel, amplified
Past others both in beauty and in size,
Yet lay next hand, rubb’d it, and straight did rise
A warm fume from it; steel being that did raise
(As agent) the attenuated bays
To that hot vapour. So that Hermes found
Both fire first, and of it the seed close bound
In other substances; and then the seed
He multiplied, of sere-wood making feed
The apt heat of it, in a pile combined
Laid in a low pit, that in flames straight shined,
And cast a sparkling crack up to the sky,
All the dry parts so fervent were, and high
In their combustion. And how long the force
Of glorious Vulcan kept the fire in course,
So long was he in dragging from their stall
Two of the crook-haunch’d herd, that roar’d withal,
And raged for fear, t’ approach the sacred fire,
To which did all his dreadful pow’rs aspire.
When, blust’ring forth their breath, he on the soil
Cast both at length, though with a world of toil,
For long he was in getting them to ground
After their through-thrust and most mortal wound.
But work to work he join’d, the flesh and cut,
Cover’d with fat, and, on treen broches put,
In pieces roasted; but in th’ intestines
The black blood, and the honorary chines,
Together with the carcases, lay there,
Cast on the cold earth, as no Deities’ cheer;
The hides upon a rugged rock he spread.
And thus were these now all in pieces shred,
And undistinguish’d from earth’s common herd,
Though born for long date, and to heaven endear’d,
And now must ever live in dead event.
But Hermes, here hence having his content,
Cared for no more, but drew to places even
The fat-works, that, of force, must have for heaven
Their capital ends, though stol’n, and therefore were
In twelve parts cut, for twelve choice Deities’ cheer,
By this devotion. To all which he gave
Their several honours, and did wish to have
His equal part thereof, as free and well
As th’ other Deities; but the fatty smell
Afflicted him, though he Immortal were,
Playing mortal parts, and being like mortals here
Yet his proud mind nothing the more obey’d
For being a God himself, and his own aid
Having to cause his due, and though in heart
He highly wish’d it; but the weaker part
Subdued the stronger, and went on in ill.
Even heavenly pow’r had rather have his will
Than have his right; and will’s the worst of all,
When but in least sort it is criminal,
One taint being author of a number still.
And thus, resolved to leave his hallow’d hill,
First both the fat parts and the fleshy all
Taking away, at the steep-entried stall
He laid all, all the feet and heads entire,
And all the sere-wood, making clear with fire.
And now, he leaving there then all things done,
And finish’d in their fit perfection,
The coals put out, and their black ashes thrown
From all discovery by the lovely light
The cheerful moon cast, shining all the night,
He straight assumed a novel voice’s note,
And in the whirl-pit-eating flood afloat
He set his sandals. When now, once again
The that-morn-born Cyllenius did attain
His home’s divine height; all the far-stretch’d way
No one bless’d God encount’ring his assay,
Nor mortal man; nor any dog durst spend
His born-to-bark mouth at him; till in th’ end
He reach’d his cave, and at the gate went in
Crooked, and wrapt into a fold so thin
That no eye could discover his repair,
But as a darkness of th’ autumnal air.
When, going on fore-right, he straight arrived
At his rich fane; his soft feet quite deprived
Of all least noise of one that trod the earth,
They trod so swift to reach his room of birth.
Where, in his swath-bands he his shoulders wrapt,
And (like an infant, newly having scap’t
The teeming straits) as in the palms he lay
Of his loved nurse. Yet instantly would play
(Freeing his right hand) with his bearing cloth
About his knees wrapt, and straight (loosing both
His right and left hand) with his left he caught
His much-loved lute. His mother yet was taught
His wanton wiles, nor could a God’s wit lie
Hid from a Goddess, who did therefore try
His answer thus: “Why, thou made-all-of-sleight,
And whence arriv’st thou in this rest of night?
Improvident impudent! In my conceit
Thou rather shouldst be getting forth thy gate,
With all flight fit for thy endanger’d state,
(In merit of th’ inevitable bands
To be impos’d by vex’d Latona’s hands,
Justly incens’d for her Apollo’s harms)
Than lie thus wrapt, as ready for her arms,
To take thee up and kiss thee. Would to heaven,
In cross of that high grace, thou hadst been given
Up to perdition, ere poor mortals bear
Those black banes, that thy Father Thunderer
Hath planted thee of purpose to confer
On them and Deities!” He returned reply:
“As master of the feats of policy,
Mother, why aim you thus amiss at me,
As if I were a son that infancy
Could keep from all the skill that age can teach,
Or had in cheating but a childish reach,
And of a mother’s mandates fear’d the breach?
I mount that art at first, that will be best
When all times consummate their cunningest,
Able to counsel now myself and thee,
In all things best, to all eternity.
We cannot live like Gods here without gifts,
No, nor without corruption and shifts,
And, much less, without eating; as we must
In keeping thy rules, and in being just,
Of which we cannot undergo the loads.
’Tis better here to imitate the Gods,
And wine or wench out all time’s periods,
To that end growing rich in ready heaps,
Stored with revenues, being in corn-field reaps
Of infinite acres, than to live enclosed
In caves, to all earth’s sweetest air exposed.
I as much honour hold as Phœbus does;
And if my Father please not to dispose
Possessions to me, I myself will see
If I can force them in; for I can be
Prince of all thieves. And, if Latona’s son
Make after my stealth indignation,
I’ll have a scape as well as he a search,
And overtake him with a greater lurch;
For I can post to Pythos, and break through
His huge house there, where harbours wealth enough,
Most precious tripods, caldrons, steel, and gold,
Garments rich wrought, and full of liberal fold.
All which will I at pleasure own, and thou
Shalt see all, wilt thou but thy sight bestow.”
Thus changed great words the Goat-hide-wearer’s son,
And Maia of majestic fashion.
And now the air-begot Aurora rose
From out the Ocean great-in-ebbs-and-flows,
When, at the never-shorn pure-and-fair grove
(Onchestus) consecrated to the love
Of round-and-long-neck’d Neptune, Phœbus found
A man whom heavy years had press’d half round,
And yet at work in plashing of a fence
About a vineyard, that had residence
Hard by the highway; whom Latona’s son
Made it not strange, but first did question,
And first saluted: “Ho you! aged sire,
That here are hewing from the vine the briar,
For certain oxen I come here t’ inquire
Out of Pieria; females all, and rear’d
All with horns wreath’d, unlike the common herd;
A coal-black bull fed by them all alone;
And all observ’d, for preservation,
Through all their foody and delicious fen
With four fierce mastiffs, like one-minded men.
These left their dogs and bull (which I admire)
And, when was near set day’s eternal fire,
From their fierce guardians, from their delicate fare,
Made clear departure. To me then declare,
O old man, long since born, if thy grave ray
Hath any man seen making steathful way
With all those oxen.” Th’ old man made reply:
“’Tis hard, O friend, to render readily
Account of all that may invade mine eye,
For many a traveller this highway treads,
Some in much ills search, some in noble threads,
Leading their lives out; but I this young day,
Even from her first point, have made good display
Of all men passing this abundant hill
Planted with vines, and no such stealthful ill
Her light hath shown me; but last evening, late,
I saw a thing that show’d of childish state
To my old lights, and seem’d as he pursued
A herd of oxen with brave heads endued,
Yet but an infant, and retain’d a rod;
Who wearily both this and that way trod,
His head still backwards turn’d.” This th’ old man spake;
Which he well thought upon, and swiftly brake
Into his pursuit with abundant wing,
That strook but one plain, ere he knew the thing
That was the thief to be th’ impostor born;
Whom Jove yet with his son’s name did adorn.
In study and with ardour then the King
(Jove’s dazzling son) placed his exploring wing
On sacred Pylos, for his forced herd,
His ample shoulders in a cloud enspher’d
Of fiery crimson. Straight the steps he found
Of his stol’n herd, and said: “Strange sights confound
My apprehensive powers, for here I see
The tracks of oxen, but aversively
Converted towards the Pierian hills,
As treading to their mead of daffodils:
But nor mine eye men’s feet nor women’s draws,
Nor hoary wolves’, nor bears’, nor lions’, paws,
Nor thick-neck’d bulls, they show. But he that does
These monstrous deeds, with never so swift shoes
Hath pass’d from that hour hither, but from hence
His foul course may meet fouler consequence.”
With this took Phœbus wing; and Hermes still,
For all his threats, secure lay in his hill
Wall’d with a wood; and more, a rock, beside,
Where a retreat ran, deeply multiplied
In blinding shadows, and where th’ endless Bride
Bore to Saturnius his ingenious son;
An odour, worth a heart’s desire, being thrown
Along the heaven-sweet hill, on whose herb fed
Rich flocks of sheep, that bow not where they tread
Their horny pasterns. There the Light of men
(Jove’s son, Apollo) straight descended then
The marble pavement, in that gloomy den.
On whom when Jove and Maia’s son set eye,
Wroth for his oxen, on then, instantly,
His odorous swath-bands flew; in which as close
Th’ impostor lay, as in the cool repose
Of cast-on ashes hearths of burning coals
Lie in the woods hid, under the controls
Of skilful colliers; even so close did lie
Inscrutable Hermes in Apollo’s eye,
Contracting his great Godhead to a small
And infant likeness, feet, hands, head, and all.
And as a hunter hath been often view’d,
From chase retired, with both his hands embrued
In his game’s blood, that doth for water call
To cleanse his hands, and to provoke withal
Delightsome sleep, new-wash’d and laid to rest;
So now lay Hermes in the close-compress’d
Chace of his oxen, his new-found-out lute
Beneath his arm held, as if no pursuit
But that prise, and the virtue of his play,
His heart affected. But to Phœbus lay
His close heart open; and he likewise knew
The brave hill-nymph there, and her dear son, new-
Born, and as well wrapt in his wiles as weeds.
All the close shrouds too, for his rapinous deeds,
In all the cave he knew; and with his key
He open’d three of them, in which there lay
Silver and gold-heaps, nectar infinite store,
And dear ambrosia; and of weeds she wore,
Pure white and purple, a rich wardrobe shined.
Fit for the bless’d states of Pow’rs so divined.
All which discover’d, thus to Mercury
He offer’d conference: “Infant! You that lie
Wrapt so in swath-bands, instantly unfold
In what conceal’d retreats of yours you hold
My oxen stol’n by you; or straight we shall
Jar, as beseems not Pow’rs Celestial.
For I will take and hurl thee to the deeps
Of dismal Tartarus, where ill Death keeps
His gloomy and inextricable fates,
And to no eye that light illuminates
Mother nor Father shall return thee free,
But under earth shall sorrow fetter thee,
And few repute thee their superior.”
On him replied craft’s subtlest Counsellor:
“What cruel speech hath past Latona’s care!
Seeks he his stol‘n wild-cows where Deities are?
I have nor seen nor heard, nor can report
From others’ mouths one word of their resort
To any stranger. Nor will I, to gain
A base reward, a false relation feign.
Nor would I, could I tell. Resemble I
An ox-thief, or a man? Especially
A man of such a courage, such a force
As to that labour goes, that violent course?
No infant’s work is that. My pow’rs aspire
To sleep, and quenching of my hunger’s fire
With mother’s milk, and, ’gainst cold shades, to arm
With cradle-cloths my shoulders, and baths warm,
That no man may conceive the war you threat
Can spring in cause from my so peaceful heat.
And, even amongst th’ Immortals it would bear
Event of absolute miracle, to hear
A new-born infant’s forces should transcend
The limits of his doors; much less contend
With untam’d oxen. This speech nothing seems
To savour the decorum of the beams
Cast round about the air Apollo breaks,
Where his divine mind her intention speaks.
I brake but yesterday the blessed womb,
My feet are tender, and the common tomb
Of men (the Earth) lies sharp beneath their tread.
But, if you please, even by my Father’s head
I’ll take the great oath, that nor I protest
Myself to author on your interest
Any such usurpation, nor have I
Seen any other that feloniously
Hath forced your oxen. Strange thing! What are those
Oxen of yours? Or what are oxen? Knows
My rude mind, think you? My ears only touch
At their renown, and hear that there are such.”
This speech he pass’d; and, ever as he spake,
Beams from the hair about his eyelids brake,
His eyebrows up and down cast, and his eye
Every way look’d askance and carelessly,
And he into a lofty whistling fell,
As if he idle thought Apollo’s spell.
Apollo, gently smiling, made reply:
“O thou impostor, whose thoughts ever lie
In labour with deceit! For certain, I
Retain opinion, that thou (even thus soon)
Hast ransack’d many a house, and not in one
Night’s-work alone, nor in one country neither,
Hast been besieging house and man together,
Rigging and rifling all ways, and no noise
Made with thy soft feet, where it all destroys.
Soft, therefore, well, and tender, thou may’st call
The feet that thy stealths go and fly withal,
For many a field-bred herdsman (unheard still)
Hast thou made drown the caverns of the hill,
Where his retreats lie, with his helpless tears,
When any flesh-stealth thy desire endears,
And thou encount’rest either flocks of sheep,
Or herds of oxen! Up then! Do not sleep
Thy last nap in thy cradle, but come down,
Companion of black night, and, for this crown
Of thy young rapines, bear from all the state
And style of Prince Thief, into endless date.”
This said, he took the infant in his arms,
And with him the remembrance of his harms,
This presage utt’ring, lifting him aloft:
“Be evermore the miserably-soft
Slave of the belly, pursuivant of all,
And author of all mischiefs capital.”
He scorn’d his prophecy so he sneezed in’s face
Most forcibly; which hearing, his embrace
He loathed and hurl’d him ’gainst the ground; yet still
Took seat before him, though, with all the ill
He bore by him, he would have left full fain
That hewer of his heart so into twain.
Yet salv’d all thus: “Come, you so-swaddled thing!
Issue of Maia, and the Thunder’s King!
Be confident, I shall hereafter find
My broad-brow’d oxen, my prophetic mind
So far from blaming this thy course, that I
Foresee thee in it to posterity
The guide of all men, always, to their ends.”
This spoken, Hermes from the earth ascends,
Starting aloft, and as in study went,
Wrapping himself in his integument,
And thus ask’d Phœbus: “Whither force you me,
Far-shot, and far most powerful Deity?
I know, for all your feigning, you’re still wroth
About your oxen, and suspect my troth.
O Jupiter! I wish the general race
Of all earth’s oxen rooted from her face.
I steal your oxen! I again profess
That neither I have stol’n them, nor can guess
Who else should steal them. What strange beasts are these
Your so-loved oxen? I must say, to please
Your humour thus far, that even my few hours
Have heard their fame. But be the sentence yours
Of the debate betwixt us, or to Jove
(For more indifferency) the cause remove.”
Thus when the solitude-affecting God,
And the Latonian seed, had laid abroad
All things betwixt them; though not yet agreed,
Yet, might I speak, Apollo did proceed
Nothing unjustly, to charge Mercury
With stealing of the cows he does deny.
But his profession was, with filed speech,
And craft’s fair compliments, to overreach
All, and even Phœbus. Who because he knew
His trade of subtlety, he still at view
Hunted his foe through all the sandy way
Up to Olympus. Nor would let him stray
From out his sight, but kept behind him still.
And now they reach’d the odorif’rous hill
Of high Olympus, to their Father Jove,
To arbitrate the cause in which they strove.
Where, before both, talents of justice were
Propos’d for him whom Jove should sentence clear,
In cause of their contention. And now
About Olympus, ever crown’d with snow,
The rumour of their controversy flew.
All the Incorruptible, to their view,
On Heaven’s steep mountain made return’d repair.
Hermes, and He that light hurls through the air,
Before the Thund’rer’s knees stood; who begun
To question thus far his illustrious Son:
“Phœbus! To what end bring’st thou captive here
Him in whom my mind puts delights so dear?
This new-born infant, that the place supplies
Of Herald yet to all the Deities?
This serious business, you may witness, draws
The Deities’ whole Court to discuss the cause.”
Phœbus replied: “And not unworthy is
The cause of all the Court of Deities,
For, you shall hear, it comprehends the weight
Of devastation, and the very height
Of spoil and rapine, even of Deities’ rights.
Yet you, as if myself loved such delights,
Use words that wound my heart. I bring you here
An infant, that, even now, admits no peer
In rapes and robb’ries. Finding out his place,
After my measure of an infinite space,
In the Cyllenian mountain, such a one
In all the art of opprobration,
As not in all the Deities I have seen,
Nor in th’ oblivion-mark’d whole race of men.
In night he drave my oxen from their leas,
Along the lofty roar-resounding seas,
From out the road-way quite; the steps of them
So quite transpos’d, as would amaze the beam
Of any mind’s eye, being so infinite much
Involv’d in doubt, as show’d a deified touch
Went to the work’s performance; all the way,
Through which my cross-hoved cows he did convey,
Had dust so darkly-hard to search, and he
So past all measure wrapt in subtilty.
For, nor with feet, nor hands, he form’d his steps,
In passing through the dry way’s sandy heaps,
But used another counsel to keep hid
His monstrous tracts, that show’d as one had slid
On oak or other boughs, that swept out still
The footsteps of his oxen, and did fill
Their prints up ever, to the daffodill
(Or dainty-feeding meadow) as they trod,
Driven by this cautelous and infant God.
A mortal man, yet, saw him driving on
His prey to Pylos. Which when he had done,
And got his pass sign’d, with a sacred fire,
In peace, and freely (though to his desire,
Not to the Gods, he offer’d part of these
My ravish’d oxen) he retires, and lies,
Like to the gloomy night, in his dim den,
All hid in darkness; and in clouts again
Wrapp’d him so closely, that the sharp-seen eye
Of your own eagle could not see him lie.
For with his hands the air he rarified
(This way, and that moved) till bright gleams did glide
About his being, that, if any eye
Should dare the darkness, light appos’d so nigh
Might blind it quite with her antipathy.
Which wile he wove, in curious care t’ illude
Th’ extreme of any eye that could intrude.
On which relying, he outrageously
(When I accus’d him) trebled his reply:
‘I did not see, I did not hear, nor I
Will tell at all, that any other stole
Your broad-brow’d beeves. Which an impostor’s soul
Would soon have done, and any author fain
Of purpose only a reward to gain.’
And thus he colour’d truth in every lie.”
This said, Apollo sat; and Mercury
The Gods’ Commander pleased with this reply:
“Father! I’ll tell thee truth (for I am true,
And far from art to lie): He did pursue
Even to my cave his oxen this self day,
The sun new-raising his illustrious ray;
But brought with him none of the Bliss-endued,
Nor any ocular witness, to conclude
His bare assertion; but his own command
Laid on with strong and necessary hand,
To show his oxen; using threats to cast
My poor and infant powers into the vast
Of ghastly Tartarus; because he bears
Of strength-sustaining youth the flaming years,
And I but yesterday produced to light.
By which it fell into his own free sight,
That I in no similitude appear’d
Of power to be the forcer of a herd.
And credit me, O Father, since the grace
Of that name, in your style, you please to place,
I drave not home his oxen, no, nor prest
Past mine own threshold; for ’tis manifest,
I reverence with my soul the Sun, and all
The knowing dwellers in this heavenly Hall,
Love you, observe the least; and ’tis most clear
In your own knowledge, that my merits bear
No least guilt of his blame. To all which I
Dare add heaven’s great oath, boldly swearing by
All these so well-built entries of the Blest.
And therefore when I saw myself so prest
With his reproaches, I confess I burn’d
In my pure gall, and harsh reply return’d.
Add your aid to your younger then, and free
The scruple fixt in Phœbus’ jealousy.”
This said he wink’d upon his Sire; and still
His swathbands held beneath his arm; no will
Discern’d in him to hide, but have them shown.
Jove laugh’d aloud at his ingenious Son,
Quitting himself with art, so likely wrought,
As show’d in his heart not a rapinous thought;
Commanding both to bear atoned minds
And seek out th’ oxen; in which search he binds
Hermes to play the guide, and show the Sun
(All grudge exil’d) the shrowd to which he won
His fair-eyed oxen; then his forehead bow’d
For sign it must be so; and Hermes show’d
His free obedience; so soon he inclined
To his persuasion and command his mind.
Now, then, Jove’s jarring Sons no longer stood,
But sandy Pylos and th’ Alphæan flood
Reach’d instantly, and made as quick a fall
On those rich-feeding fields and lofty stall
Where Phœbus’ oxen Hermes safely kept,
Driven in by night. When suddenly he stept
Up to the stony cave, and into light
Drave forth the oxen. Phœbus at first sight
Knew them the same, and saw apart dispread
Upon a high-rais’d rock the hides new flead
Of th’ oxen sacrific’d. Then Phœbus said:
“O thou in crafty counsels undisplaid!
How couldst thou cut the throats, and cast to earth,
Two such huge oxen, being so young a birth,
And a mere infant? I admire thy force,
And will, behind thy back. But this swift course
Of growing into strength thou hadst not need
Continue any long date, O thou Seed
Of honour’d Maia!” Hermes (to show how
He did those deeds) did forthwith cut and bow
Strong osiers in soft folds, and strappled straight
One of his hugest oxen, all his weight
Lay’ng prostrate on the earth at Phœbus’ feet,
All his four cloven hoves eas’ly made to greet
Each other upwards, all together brought.
In all which bands yet all the beast’s powers wrought,
To rise, and stand; when all the herd about
The mighty Hermes rush’d in, to help out
Their fellow from his fetters. Phœbus’ view
Of all this up to admiration drew
Even his high forces; and stern looks he threw
At Hermes for his herd’s wrong, and the place
To which he had retir’d them, being in grace
And fruitful riches of it so entire;
All which set all his force on envious fire.
All whose heat flew out of his eyes in flames,
Which fain he would have hid, to hide the shames,
Of his ill-govern’d passions. But with ease
Hermes could calm them, and his humours please.
Still at his pleasure, were he ne’er so great
In force and fortitude, and high in heat,
In all which he his lute took, and assay’d
A song upon him, and so strangely play’d,
That from his hand a ravishing horror flew.
Which Phœbus into laughter turn’d, and grew
Pleasant past measure; tunes so artful clear
Strook even his heart-strings, and his mind made hear.
His lute so powerful was in forcing love,
As his hand rul’d it, that from him it drove
All fear of Phœbus; yet he gave him still
The upper hand; and, to advance his skill
To utmost miracle, he play’d sometimes
Single awhile; in which, when all the climes
Of rapture he had reach’d, to make the Sun
Admire enough, O then his voice would run
Such points upon his play, and did so move,
They took Apollo prisoner to his love.
And now the deathless Gods and deathful Earth
He sung, beginning at their either’s birth
To full extent of all their empery.
And, first, the honour to Mnemosyne,
The Muses’ mother, of all Goddess states
He gave; even forced to’t by the equal fates.
And then (as it did in priority fall
Of age and birth) he celebrated all.
And with such elegance and order sung
(His lute still touch’d, to stick more off his tongue)
That Phœbus’ heart with infinite love he eat.
Who, therefore, thus did his deserts entreat:
“Master of sacrifice! Chief soul of feast!
Patient of all pains! Artizan so blest,
That all things thou canst do in anyone!
Worth fifty oxen is th’ invention
Of this one lute. We both shall now, I hope,
In firm peace work to all our wishes’ scope.
Inform me (thou that every way canst wind,
And turn to act, all wishes of thy mind)
Together with thy birth came all thy skill?
Or did some God, or God-like man, instill
This heavenly song to thee? Methink I hear
A new voice, such as never yet came near
The breast of any, either man or God,
Till in thee it had prime and period.
What art, what Muse that med’cine can produce
For cares most cureless, what inveterate use
Or practice of a virtue so profuse
(Which three do all the contribution keep
That Joy or Love confers, or pleasing Sleep.)
Taught thee the sovereign facture of them all?
I of the Muses am the capital
Consort, or follower; and to these belong
The grace of dance, all worthy ways of song,
And ever-flourishing verse, the delicate set
And sound of instruments. But never yet
Did anything so much affect my mind
With joy and care to compass, as this kind
Of song and play, that for the spritely feast
Of flourishing assemblies are the best
And aptest works that ever worth gave act.
My powers with admiration stand distract,
To hear with what a hand to make in love
Thou rul’st thy lute. And (though thy yong’st hours move
At full art in old councils) here I vow
(Even by this cornel dart I use to throw)
To thee, and to thy mother, I’ll make thee
Amongst the Gods of glorious degree,
Guide of men’s ways and theirs; and will impart
To thee the mighty imperatory art,
Bestow rich gifts on thee, and in the end
Never deceive thee.” Hermes (as a friend
That wrought on all advantage, and made gain
His capital object) thus did entertain
Phœbus Apollo: “Do thy dignities,
Far-working God and circularly wise,
Demand my virtues? Without envy I
Will teach thee to ascend my faculty.
And this day thou shalt reach it; finding me,
In acts and counsels, all ways kind to thee,
As one that all things knows, and first tak’st seat
Amongst th’ Immortals, being good and great,
And therefore to Jove’s love mak’st free access,
Even out of his accomplisht holiness.
Great gifts he likewise gives thee; who, fame says,
Hast won thy greatness by his will, his ways,
By him know’st all the powers prophetical,
O thou far-worker, and the fates of all!
Yea, and I know thee rich, yet apt to learn,
And even thy wish dost but discern and earn.
And since thy soul so burns to know the way
So play and sing as I do, sing, and play;
Play, and perfection in thy play employ;
And be thy care, to learn things good, thy joy.
Take thou my lute (my love) and give thou me
The glory of so great a faculty.
This sweet-tuned consort, held but in thy hand,
Sing, and perfection in thy song command.
For thou already hast the way to speak
Fairly and elegantly, and to break
All eloquence into thy utter’d mind.
One gift from heaven found may another find.
Use then securely this thy gift, and go
To feasts and dances that enamour so,
And to that covetous sport of getting glory,
That day nor night will suffer to be sory.
Whoever does but say in verse, sings still;
Which he that can of any other skill
Is capable, so he be taught by art
And wisdom, and can speak at every part
Things pleasing to an understanding mind;
And such a one that seeks this lute shall find.
Him still it teaches eas’ly, though he plays
Soft voluntaries only, and assays
As wanton as the sports of children are,
And (even when he aspires to singular
In all the mast’ries he shall play or sing)
Finds the whole work but an unhappy thing,
He, I say, sure shall of this lute be king.
But he, whoever rudely sets upon
Of this lute’s skill th’ inquest or question
Never so ardently and angrily,
Without the aptness and ability
Of art, and nature fitting, never shall
Aspire to this, but utter trivial
And idle accents, though sung ne’er so loud,
And never so commended of the crowd.
But thee I know, O eminent Son of Jove,
The fiery learner of whatever Love
Hath sharpen’d thy affections to achieve,
And thee I give this lute. Let us now live
Feeding upon the hill and horse-fed earth
Our never-handled oxen; whose dear birth
Their females, fellow’d with their males, let flow
In store enough hereafter; nor must you
(However cunning-hearted your wits are)
Boil in your gall a grudge too circular.”
Thus gave he him his lute, which he embrac’d,
And gave again a goad, whose bright head cast
Beams like the light forth; leaving to his care
His oxen’s keeping. Which, with joyful fare,
He took on him. The lute Apollo took
Into his left hand, and aloft he shook
Delightsome sounds up, to which God did sing.
Then were the oxen to their endless spring
Turn’d; and Jove’s two illustrous Offsprings flew
Up to Olympus where it ever snew,
Delighted with their lute’s sound all the way.
Whom Jove much joy’d to see, and endless stay
Gave to their knot of friendship. From which date
Hermes gave Phœbus an eternal state
In his affection, whose sure pledge and sign
His lute was, and the doctrine so divine
Jointly conferr’d on him; which well might be
True symbol of his love’s simplicity.
On th’ other part, Apollo in his friend
Form’d th’ art of wisdom, to the binding end
Of his vow’d friendship; and (for further meed)
Gave him the far-heard fistulary reed.
For all these forms of friendship, Phœbus yet
Fear’d that both form and substance were not met
In Mercury’s intentions; and, in plain,
Said (since he saw him born to craft and gain,
And that Jove’s will had him the honour done
To change at his will the possession
Of others’ goods) he fear’d his breach of vows
In stealing both his lute and cunning bows,
And therefore wish’d that what the Gods affect
Himself would witness, and to his request
His head bow, swearing by th’ impetuous flood
Of Styx that of his whole possessions not a good
He would diminish, but therein maintain
The full content in which his mind did reign.
And then did Maia’s son his forehead bow,
Making, by all that he desired, his vow
Never to prey more upon anything
In just possession of the far-shot King,
Nor ever to come near a house of his.
Latonian Phœbus bow’d his brow to this,
With his like promise, saying: “Not anyone
Of all the Gods, nor any man, that son
Is to Saturnius, is more dear to me,
More trusted, nor more honour’d is than thee.
Which yet with greater gifts of Deity
In future I’ll confirm, and give thy state
A rod that riches shall accumulate,
Nor leave the bearer thrall to death, or fate,
Or any sickness. All of gold it is,
Three-leaved, and full of all felicities.
And, this shall be thy guardian, this shall give
The Gods to thee in all the truth they live,
And, finally, shall this the tut’ress be
Of all the words and works informing me
From Jove’s high counsels, making known to thee
All my instructions. But to prophesy,
Of best of Jove’s beloved, and that high skill
Which to obtain lies burning in thy will,
Nor thee, nor any God, will Fate let learn.
Only Jove’s mind hath insight to discern
What that importeth; yet am I allow’d
(My known faith trusted, and my forehead bow’d,
Our great oath taken, to resolve to none
Of all th’ Immortals the restriction
Of that deep knowledge) of it all the mind.
Since then it sits in such fast bounds confin’d,
O brother, when the golden rod is held
In thy strong hand, seek not to have reveal’d
Any sure fate that Jove will have conceal’d.
For no man shall, by know’ng, prevent his fate;
And therefore will I hold in my free state
The pow’r to hurt and help what man I will,
Of all the greatest, or least touch’d with ill,
That walk within the circle of mine eye,
In all the tribes and sexes it shall try.
Yet, truly, any man shall have his will
To reap the fruits of my prophetic skill,
Whoever seeks it by the voice or wing
Of birds, born truly such events to sing.
Nor will I falsely, nor with fallacies,
Infringe the truth on which his faith relies,
But he that truths in chattering plumes would find,
Quite opposite to them that prompt my mind,
And learn by natural forgers of vain lies
The more-than-ever-certain Deities,
That man shall sea-ways tread that leave no tracts,
And false or no guide find for all his facts.
And yet will I his gifts accept as well
As his to whom the simple truth I tell.
One other thing to thee I’ll yet make known,
Maia’s exceedingly renowned son,
And Jove’s, and of the Gods’ whole session
The most ingenious genius: There dwell
Within a crooked cranny, in a dell
Beneath Parnassus, certain Sisters born,
Call’d Parcæ, whom extreme swift wings adorn,
Their number three, that have upon their heads
White barley-flour still sprinkled, and are maids;
And these are schoolmistresses of things to come,
Without the gift of prophecy. Of whom
(Being but a boy, and keeping oxen near)
I learn’d their skill, though my great Father were
Careless of it, or them. These flying from home
To others’ roofs, and fed with honeycomb,
Command all skill, and (being enraged then)
Will freely tell the truths of things to men.
But if they give them not that Gods’ sweet meat,
They then are apt to utter their deceit,
And lead men from their way. And these will I
Give thee hereafter, when their scrutiny
And truth thou hast both made and learn’d; and then
Please thyself with them, and the race of men
(Wilt thou know any) with thy skill endear,
Who will, be sure, afford it greedy ear,
And hear it often if it prove sincere.
Take these, O Maia’s son, and in thy care
Be horse and oxen, all such men as are
Patient of labour, lions, white-tooth’d boars,
Mastiffs, and flocks that feed the flow’ry shores,
And every four-foot beast; all which shall stand
In awe of thy high imperatory hand.
Be thou to Dis, too, sole Ambassador,
Who, though all gifts and bounties he abhor,
On thee he will bestow a wealthy one.”
Thus king Apollo honour’d Maia’s son
With all the rites of friendship; all whose love
Had imposition from the will of Jove.
And thus with Gods and mortals Hermes lived,
Who truly help’d but few, but all deceived
With an undifferencing respect, and made
Vain words and false persuasions his trade.
His deeds were all associates of the night,
In which his close wrongs cared for no man’s right.
So all salutes to Hermes that are due,
Of whom, and all Gods, shall my Muse sing true.

THE END OF THE HYMN TO HERMES.

A Hymn to Venus (First Hymn)

The force, O Muse, and functions now unfold
Of Cyprian Venus, grac’d with mines of gold;
Who even in Deities lights love’s sweet desire,
And all Death’s kinds of men makes kiss her fire,
All air’s wing’d nation, all the belluine,
That or the earth feeds, or the seas confine.
To all which appertain the love and care
Of well-crown’d Venus’ works. Yet three there are
Whose minds She neither can deceive nor move;
Pallas, the Seed of Ægis-bearing Jove,
Who still lives indevirginate, her eyes
Being blue, and sparkling like the freezing skies,
Whom all the gold of Venus never can
Tempt to affect her facts with God or man.
She, loving strife, and Mars’s working banes,
Pitch’d fields and fights, and famous artizans,
Taught earthy men first all the arts that are,
Chariots, and all the frames vehicular,
Chiefly with brass arm’d, and adorn’d for war.
Where Venus only soft-skinn’d wenches fills
With wanton house-works, and suggests those skills
Still to their studies. Whom Diana neither,
That bears the golden distaff, and together
Calls horns, and hollows, and the cries of hounds,
And owns the epithet of loving sounds
For their sakes, springing from such spritely sports,
Can catch with her kind lures; but hill resorts
To wild-beasts, slaughters, accents far-off heard
Of harps and dances, and of woods unshear’d
The sacred shades she loves, yet likes as well
Cities where good men and their offspring dwell.
The third, whom her kind passions nothing please,
Is virgin Vesta; whom Saturnides
Made reverend with his counsels, when his Sire,
That adverse counsels agitates, life’s fire
Had kindled in her, being his last-begot.
Whom Neptune woo’d to knit with him the knot
Of honour’d nuptials, and Apollo too;
Which with much vehemence she refused to do,
And stern repulses put upon them both,
Adding to all her vows the Gods’ great oath,
And touching Jove’s chin, which must consummate
All vows so bound, that she would hold her state,
And be th’ invincible Maid of Deities
Through all her days’ dates. For Saturnides
Gave her a fair gift in her nuptials’ stead,
To sit in midst of his house, and be fed
With all the free and richest feast of heaven,
In all the temples of the Gods being given
The prize of honour. Not a mortal man,
(That either, of the Pow’rs Olympian
His half-birth having, may be said to be
A mortal of the Gods, or else that he,
Deities’ wills doing, is of Deity)
But gives her honour of the amplest kind.
Of all these three can Venus not a mind
Deceive, or set on forces to reflect.
Of all Pow’rs else yet, not a sex, nor sect,
Flies Venus; either of the blessed Gods,
Or men confin’d in mortal periods.
But even the mind of Jove she doth seduce,
That chides with thunder so her lawless use
In human creatures, and by lot is given
Of all most honour, both in earth and heaven.
And yet even his all-wise and mighty mind
She, when she lists, can forge affects to blind,
And mix with mortal dames his Deity,
Conceal’d at all parts from the jealous eye
Of Juno, who was both his sister born,
And made his wife; whom beauty did adorn
Past all the bevy of Immortal Dames,
And whose so chiefly-glorified flames
Cross-counsell’d Saturn got, and Rhæa bore,
And Jove’s pure counsels (being conqueror)
His wife made of his sister. Ay, and more,
Cast such an amorous fire into her mind
As made her (like him) with the mortal kind
Meet in unmeet bed; using utmost haste,
Lest she should know that he lived so unchaste,
Before herself felt that fault in her heart,
And gave her tongue too just edge of desert
To tax his lightness. With this end, beside,
Lest laughter-studying Venus should deride
The Gods more than the Goddesses, and say
That she the Gods commix’d in amorous play
With mortal dames, begetting mortal seed
T’ immortal sires, and not make Goddesses breed
The like with mortal fathers. But, t’ acquite
Both Gods and Goddesses of her despite,
Jove took (even in herself) on him her pow’r,
And made her with a mortal paramour
Use as deform’d a mixture as the rest;
Kindling a kind affection in her breast
To God-like-limb’d Anchises, as he kept,
On Ida’s top-on-top-to-heaven’s-pole-heapt,[1]
Amongst the many fountains there, his herd.
For, after his brave person had appear’d
To her bright eye, her heart flew all on fire,
And to amaze she burn’d in his desire,
Flew straight to Cyprus, to her odorous fane
And altars, that the people Paphian
Advanced to her. Where, soon as enter’d, she
The shining gates shut; and the Graces three
Wash’d, and with oils of everlasting scent
Bathed, as became, her deathless lineament.
Then her ambrosian mantle she assum’d,
With rich and odoriferous airs perfum’d.
Which being put on, and all her trims beside
Fair, and with all allurements amplified,
The all-of-gold-made laughter-loving Dame
Left odorous Cyprus, and for Troy became
A swift contendress, her pass cutting all
Along the clouds, and made her instant fall
On fountful Ida, that her mother-breasts
Gives to the preyful brood of savage beasts.
And through the hill she went the ready way
T’ Anchises’ oxstall, where did fawn and play
About her blessed feet wolves grisly-gray,
Terrible lions, many a mankind bear,
And lybberds swift, insatiate of red deer.
Whose sight so pleas’d, that, ever as she past,
Through every beast a kindly love she cast,
That, in their dens obscured with shadows deep,
Made all, distinguish’d in kind couples, sleep.
And now she reach’d the rich pavilion
Of the heroë, in whom heavens had shown
A fair and goodly composition,
And whom she in his oxstall found, alone,
His oxen feeding in fat pastures by,
He walking up and down, sounds clear and high
From his harp striking. Then before him she
Stood like a virgin, that invincibly
Had borne her beauties; yet alluringly
Bearing her person, lest his ravish’d eye
Should chance t’ affect him with a stupid fear.
Anchises seeing her, all his senses were
With wonder stricken, and high-taken heeds
Both of her form, brave stature, and rich weeds.
For, for a veil, she shin’d in an attire
That cast a radiance past the ray of fire.
Beneath which wore she, girt to her, a gown
Wrought all with growing-rose-buds, reaching down
T’ her slender smalls, which buskins did divine,
Such as taught Thetis’ silver feet to shine.
Her soft white neck rich carquenets embraced,
Bright, and with gold in all variety graced,
That to her breasts let down lay there and shone,
As, at her joyful full, the rising Moon.
Her sight show’d miracles. Anchises’ heart
Love took into his hand, and made him part
With these high salutations; “Joy, O Queen!
Whoever of the Blest thy beauties been
That light these entries; or the Deity
That darts affecteth; or that gave the Eye
Of heaven his heat and lustre; or that moves
The hearts of all with all-commanding loves;
Or generous Themis; or the blue-eyed Maid;
Or of the Graces any that are laid
With all the Gods in comparable scales,
And whom fame up to immortality calls;
Or any of the Nymphs, that unshorn groves,
Or that this fair hill-habitation, loves,
Or valleys flowing with earth’s fattest goods,
Or fountains pouring forth eternal floods!
Say, which of all thou art, that in some place
Of circular prospect, for thine eyes’ dear grace,
I may an altar build, and to thy pow’rs
Make sacred all the year’s devoted hours,
With consecrations sweet and opulent.
Assur’d whereof, be thy benign mind bent
To these wish’d blessings of me: Give me parts
Of chief attraction in Trojan hearts;
And, after, give me the refulgency
Of most renown’d and rich posterity;
Long, and free life, and heaven’s sweet light as long;
The people’s blessings, and a health so strong
That no disease it let my life engage,
Till th’ utmost limit of a human age.”
To this Jove’s Seed this answer gave again;
“Anchises! Happiest of the human strain!
I am no Goddess! Why, a thrall to death
Think’st thou like those that immortality breathe?
A woman brought me forth; my father’s name
Was Otreüs, if ever his high fame
Thine ears have witness’d, for he govern’d all
The Phrygian state, whose every town a wall
Impregnable embrac’d. Your tongue, you hear,
I speak so well, that in my natural sphere
(As I pretend) it must have taken prime.
A woman, likewise, of the Trojan clime
Took of me, in her house, the nurse’s care
From my dear mother’s bosom; and thus are
My words of equal accent with your own.
How here I come, to make the reason known,
Argicides, that bears the golden rod,
Transferr’d me forcibly from my abode
Made with the maiden train of Her that joys
In golden shafts, and loves so well the noise
Of hounds and hunters (heaven’s pure-living Pow’r)
Where many a nymph and maid of mighty dow’r
Chaste sports employ’d, all circled with a crown
Of infinite multitude, to see so shown
Our maiden pastimes. Yet, from all the fair
Of this so forceful concourse, up in air
The golden-rod-sustaining Argus’-Guide
Rapt me in sight of all, and made me ride
Along the clouds with him, enforcing me
Through many a labour of mortality,
Through many an unbuilt region, and a rude,
Where savage beasts devour’d preys warm and crude,
And would not let my fears take one foot’s tread
On Her by whom are all lives comforted,
But said my maiden state must grace the bed
Of king Anchises, and bring forth to thee
Issue as fair as of divine degree.
Which said, and showing me thy moving grace,
Away flew he up to th’ Immortal Race,
And thus came I to thee; Necessity,
With her steel stings, compelling me t’ apply
To her high pow’r my will. But you must I
Implore by Jove, and all the reverence due
To your dear parents, who, in bearing you,
Can bear no mean sail, lead me home to them
An untouch’d maid, being brought up in th’ extreme
Of much too cold simplicity to know
The fiery cunnings that in Venus glow.
Show me to them then, and thy brothers born,
I shall appear none that parts disadorn,
But such as well may serve a brother’s wife,
And show them now, even to my future life,
If such or no my present will extend.
To horse-breed-vary’ng Phrygia likewise send,
T’ inform my sire and mother of my state,
That live for me extreme disconsolate;
Who gold enough, and well-woven weeds, will give.
All whose rich gifts in my amends receive.
All this perform’d, and celebration then
Of honour’d nuptials, that by God and men
Are held in reverence.” All this while she said,
Into his bosom jointly she convey’d
The fires of love; when, all-enamour’d, he
In these terms answer’d: “If mortality
Confine thy fortunes, and a woman were
Mother to those attractions that appear
In thy admir’d form, thy great father given
High name of Otreüs; and the Spy of heaven
(Immortal Mercury) th’ enforceful cause
That made thee lose the prize of that applause
That modesty immaculate virgins gives,
My wife thou shalt be call’d through both our lives.
Nor shall the pow’rs of men nor Gods withhold
My fiery resolution to enfold
Thy bosom in mine arms; which here I vow
To firm performance, past delay, and now.
Nor, should Apollo with his silver bow
Shoot me to instant death, would I forbear
To do a deed so full of cause so dear.
For with a heaven-sweet woman I will lie,
Though straight I stoop the house of Dis, and die.”
This said, he took her hand, and she took way
With him, her bright eyes casting round; whose stay
She stuck upon a bed, that was before
Made for the king, and wealthy coverings wore.
On which bears’ hides and big-voic’d lions’ lay,
Whose preyful lives the king had made his prey,
Hunting th’ Idalian hills. This bed when they
Had both ascended, first he took from her
The fiery weed, that was her utmost wear;
Unbutton’d her next rosy robe; and loos’d
The girdle that her slender waist enclos’d;
Unlac’d her buskins; all her jewelry
Took from her neck and breasts, and all laid by
Upon a golden-studded chair of state.
Th’ amaze of all which being remov’d, even Fate
And council of the equal Gods gave way
To this, that with a deathless Goddess lay
A deathful man; since, what his love assum’d,
Not with his conscious knowledge was presum’d.
Now when the shepherds and the herdsmen, all,
Turn’d from their flow’ry pasture to their stall,
With all their oxen, fat and frolic sheep,
Venus into Anchises cast a sleep,
Sweet and profound; while with her own hands now
With her rich weeds she did herself endow;
But so distinguish’d, that he clear might know
His happy glories; then (to her desire
Her heavenly person put in trims entire)
She by the bed stood of the well-built stall,
Advanc’d her head to state celestial,
And in her cheeks arose the radiant hue
Of rich-crown’d Venus to apparent view.
And then she rous’d him from his rest, and said:
“Up, my Dardanides, forsake thy bed.
What pleasure, late employ’d, lets humour steep
Thy lids in this inexcitable sleep?
Wake, and now say, if I appear to thee
Like her that first thine eyes conceited me.”
This started him from sleep, though deep and dear,
And passing promptly he enjoy’d his ear.
But when his eye saw Venus’ neck and eyes,
Whose beauties could not bear the counterprise
Of any other, down his own eyes fell,
Which pallid fear did from her view repell,
And made him, with a main respect beside,
Turn his whole person from her state, and hide
(With his rich weed appos’d) his royal face,
These wing’d words using: “When, at first, thy grace
Mine eyes gave entertainment, well I knew
Thy state was deified; but thou told’st not true;
And therefore let me pray thee (by thy love
Borne to thy father, Ægis-bearing Jove)
That thou wilt never let me live to be
An abject, after so divine degree
Taken in fortune, but take ruth on me,
For any man that with a Goddess lies,
Of interest in immortalities,
Is never long-liv’d.” She replied: “Forbear,
O happiest of mortal men, this fear,
And rest assured, that (not for me, at least)
Thy least ills fear fits; no, nor for the rest
Of all the Blessed, for thou art their friend;
And so far from sustaining instant end,
That to thy long-enlarg’d life there shall spring
Amongst the Trojans a dear son, and king,
To whom shall many a son, and son’s son, rise
In everlasting great posterities;
His name Æneas; therein keeping life,
For ever, in my much-conceited grief,
That I, immortal, fell into the bed
Of one whose blood mortality must shed.
But rest thou comforted, and all the race
That Troy shall propagate, in this high grace:
That, past all races else, the Gods stand near
Your glorious nation, for the forms ye bear,
And natures so ingenuous and sincere.
For which, the great-in-counsels (Jupiter)
Your gold-lock’d Ganymedes did transfer
(In rapture far from men’s depressed fates)
To make him consort with our Deified States,
And scale the tops of the Saturnian skies,
He was so mere a marvel in their eyes.
And therefore from a bowl of gold he fills
Red nectar, that the rude distension kills
Of winds that in your human stomachs breed.
But then did languor on the liver feed
Of Tros, his father, that was king of Troy,
And ever did his memory employ[2]
With loss of his dear beauty so bereaven,
Though with a sacred whirlwind rapt to heaven.
But Jove, in pity of him, saw him given
Good compensation, sending by Heaven’s Spy
White-swift-hov’d horse, that Immortality
Had made firm-spirited; and had, beside,
Hermes to see his ambassy supplied
With this vow’d bounty (using all at large
That his unalter’d counsels gave in charge)
That he himself should immortality breathe,
Expert of age and woe as well as death.
“This ambassy express’d, he mourn’d no more,
But up with all his inmost mind he bore,
Joying that he, upon his swift-hov’d horse,
Should be sustain’d in an eternal course.”
“So did the golden-throned Aurora raise,
Into her lap, another that the praise
Of an immortal fashion had in fame,
And of your nation bore the noble name,
(His title Tithon) who, not pleased with her,
As she his lovely person did transfer,
To satisfy him, she bade ask of Jove
The gift of an Immortal for her love.
Jove gave, and bound it with his bowed brow,
Performing to the utmost point his vow.
Fool that she was, that would her love engage,
And not as long ask from the bane of age
The sweet exemption, and youth’s endless flow’r!
Of which as long as both the grace and pow’r
His person entertain’d, she loved the man,
And (at the fluents of the ocean
Near Earth’s extreme bounds) dwelt with him; but when
According to the course of aged men)
On his fair head, and honourable beard,
His first grey hairs to her light eyes appear’d,
She left his bed, yet gave him still for food
The Gods’ ambrosia, and attire as good.
Till even the hate of age came on so fast
That not a lineament of his was grac’d
With pow’r of motion, nor did still sustain,
Much less, the vigour had t’ advance a vein,
The virtue lost in each exhausted limb,
That at his wish before would answer him;
All pow’rs so quite decay’d, that when he spake
His voice no perceptible accent brake.
Her counsel then thought best to strive no more,
But lay him in his bed and lock his door.
Such an Immortal would not I wish thee,
T’ extend all days so to eternity.
But if, as now, thou couldst perform thy course
In grace of form, and all corporeal force,
To an eternal date, thou then shouldst bear
My husband’s worthy name, and not a tear
Should I need rain, for thy deserts declin’d,
From my all-clouded bitterness of mind.
But now the stern storm of relentless age
Will quickly circle thee, that waits t’ engage
All men alike, even loathsomeness, and bane
Attending with it, every human wane,
Which even the Gods hate. Such a penance lies
Impos’d on flesh and blood’s infirmities!
Which I myself must taste in great degree,
And date as endless, for consorting thee.
All the Immortals with my opprobry
Are full by this time; on their hearts so lie,
(Even to the sting of fear) my cunnings us’d,
And wiving conversations infus’d
Into the bosoms of the best of them
With women, that the frail and mortal stream
Doth daily ravish. All this long since done.
Which now no more, but with effusion
Of tears, I must in heaven so much as name,
I have so forfeited in this my fame,
And am impos’d pain of so great a kind
For so much erring from a Goddess’ mind.
For I have put beneath my girdle here
A son, whose sire the human mortal sphere
Gives circumscription. But, when first the light
His eyes shall comfort, Nymphs that haunt the height
Of hills, and breasts have of most deep receipt;
Shall be his nurses; who inhabit now
A hill of so vast and divine a brow,
As man nor God can come at their retreats;
Who live long lives, and eat immortal meats,
And with Immortals in the exercise
Of comely dances dare contend, and rise
Into high question which deserves the prize.
The light Sileni mix in love with these,
And, of all Spies the Prince, Argicides;
In well-trimm’d caves their secret meetings made.
And with the lives of these doth life invade
Or odorous fir-trees, or high-foreheaded oaks,
Together taking their begetting strokes,
And have their lives and deaths of equal dates,
Trees bearing lovely and delightsome states,
Whom Earth first feeds, that men initiates.
On her high hills she doth their states sustain,
And they their own heights raise as high again.
Their growths together made, Nymphs call their groves
Vow’d to th’ Immortals services and loves;
Which men’s steels therefore touch not, but let grow.
But when wise Fates times for their fadings know,
The fair trees still before the fair Nymphs die,
The bark about them grown corrupt and dry,
And all their boughs fall’n yield to Earth her right;
And then the Nymphs’ lives leave the lovely night,
“And these Nymphs in their caves shall nurse my son,
Whom (when in him youth’s first grace is begun)
The Nymphs, his nurses, shall present to thee;
And show thee what a birth thou hast by me.
And, sure as now I tell thee all these things,
When Earth hath cloth’d her plants in five fair springs,
Myself will make return to this retreat,
And bring that flow’r of thy enamour’d heat;
Whom when thou then seest, joy shall fire thine eyes;
He shall so well present the Deities.
And then into thine own care take thy son
From his calm seat to windy Ilion,
Where, if strict question be upon the past,
Asking what mother bore beneath her waist
So dear a son, answer, as I afford
Fit admonition, nor forget a word:
They say a Nymph, call’d Calucopides,
That is with others an inhabitress
On this thy wood-crown’d hill, acknowledges
That she his life gave. But, if thou declare
The secret’s truth, and art so mad to dare
(In glory of thy fortunes) to approve
That rich-crown’d Venus mix’d with thee in love,
Jove, fired with my aspersion so dispread,
Will with a wreakful lightning dart thee dead.
“All now is told thee, comprehend it all.
Be master of thyself, and do not call
My name in question; but with reverence vow
To Deities’ angers all the awe ye owe.”
This said, She reach’d heaven, where airs ever flow.
And so, O Goddess, ever honour’d be,
In thy so odorous Cyprian empery!
My Muse, affecting first thy fame to raise,
Shall make transcension now to others’ praise.

THE END OF THE FIRST HYMN TO VENUS

[1] ᾿Ακροπόλος. Altissimum habens verticem, cujus summitas ipsum polum attingit.

[2] ἄληστος. Cujus memoria erit perpetua.

A Hymn to Venus (Second Hymn)

The reverend, rich-crown’d, and fair Queen I sing,
Venus, that owes ill fate the fortressing
Of all maritimal Cyprus; where the force
Of gentle-breathing Zephyr steer’d her course
Along the waves of the resounding sea,
While, yet unborn, in that soft foam she lay
That brought her forth; whom those fair Hours that bear
The golden bridles joyfully stood near,
Took up into their arms, and put on her
Weeds of a never-corruptible wear.
On her immortal head a crown they plac’d,
Elaborate, and with all the beauties grac’d
That gold could give it; of a weight so great,
That, to impose and take off, it had set
Three handles on it, made, for endless hold,
Of shining brass, and all adorn’d with gold.
Her soft neck all with carquenets was grac’d,
That stoop’d, and both her silver breasts embrac’d,
Which even the Hours themselves wear in resort
To Deities’ dances, and her Father’s court.
Grac’d at all parts, they brought to heaven her graces;
Whose first sight seen, all fell into embraces,
Hugg’d her white hands, saluted, wishing all
To wear her maiden flow’r in festival
Of sacred Hymen, and to lead her home;
All, to all admiration, overcome
With Cytherea with the violet crown.
So to the Black-brow’d Sweet-spoke all renown!
Prepare my song, and give me, in the end,
The victory to whose palm all contend!
So shall my Muse for ever honour thee,
And, for thy sake, thy fair posterity.

A Hymn to Bacchus, or the Pirates

Of Dionysus, noble Semele’s Son,
I now intend to render mention,
As on a prominent shore his person shone,
Like to a youth whose flow’r was newly blown,
Bright azure tresses play’d about his head,
And on his bright broad shoulders was dispread
A purple mantle. Strait he was descried
By certain manly pirates, that applied
Their utmost speed to prise him, being aboard
A well-built bark, about whose broad sides roar’d
The wine-black Tyrrhene billows; death as black
Brought them upon him in their future wrack.
For, soon as they had purchas’d but his view,
Mutual signs past them, and ashore they flew,
Took him, and brought him instantly aboard,
Soothing their hopes to have obtain’d a hoard
Of riches with him; and a Jove-kept king
To such a flow’r must needs be natural spring.
And therefore straight strong fetters they must fetch,
To make him sure. But no such strength would stretch
To his constrain’d pow’rs. Far flew all their bands
From any least force done his feet or hands.
But he sat casting smiles from his black eyes
At all their worst. At which discoveries
Made by the master, he did thus dehort
All his associates: “Wretches! Of what sort
Hold ye the person ye assay to bind?
Nay, which of all the Pow’r fully-divin’d
Esteem ye him, whose worth yields so much weight
That not our well-built bark will bear his freight?
Or Jove himself he is, or He that bears
The silver bow, or Neptune. Nor appears
In him the least resemblance of a man,
But of a strain at least Olympian.
Come! Make we quick dismission of his state,
And on the black-soil’d earth exonerate
Our sinking vessel of his deified load,
Nor dare the touch of an intangible God,
Lest winds outrageous, and of wrackful scathe,
And smoking tempests, blow his fiery wrath.”
This well-spoke master the tall captain gave
Hateful and horrible language; call’d him slave,
And bade him mark the prosp’rous gale that blew,
And how their vessel with her mainsail flew;
Bade all take arms, and said, their works requir’d
The cares of men, and not of an inspir’d
Pure zealous master; his firm hopes being fir’d
With this opinion, that they should arrive
In Ægypt straight, or Cyprus, or where live
Men whose brave breaths above the north wind blow;
Yea, and perhaps beyond their region too.
And that he made no doubt but in the end
To make his prisoner tell him every friend
Of all his offspring, brothers, wealth, and all;
Since that prise, certain, must some God let fall.
This said, the mast and mainsail up he drew,
And in the mainsail’s midst a frank gale blew;
When all his ship took arms to brave their prise.
But straight strange works appear’d to all their eyes:
First, sweet wine through their swift-black bark did flow,
Of which the odours did a little blow
Their fiery spirits, making th’ air so fine
That they in flood were there as well as wine.
A mere immortal-making savour rose,
Which on the air the Deity did impose.
The seamen see’ng all, admiration seiz’d;
Yet instantly their wonders were increas’d,
For on the topsail there ran, here and there,
A vine that grapes did in abundance bear,
And in an instant was the ship’s mainmast
With an obscure-green ivy’s arms embrac’d,
That flourish’d straight, and were with berries grac’d;
Of which did garlands circle every brow
Of all the pirates, and no one knew how.
Which when they saw, they made the master steer
Out to the shore; whom Bacchus made forbear,
With showing more wonders. On the hatches He
Appear’d a terrible lion, horribly
Roaring; and in the mid-deck a male bear,
Made with a huge mane; making all, for fear,
Crowd to the stern, about the master there,
Whose mind he still kept dauntless and sincere,
But on the captain rush’d and ramp’d, with force
So rude and sudden, that his main recourse
Was to the main-sea straight: and after him
Leapt all his mates, as trusting to their swim
To fly foul death; but so found what they fled,
Being all to dolphins metamorphosed.
The master he took ruth of, sav’d, and made
The blessed’st man that ever tried his trade,
These few words giving him: “Be confident,
Thou God-inspired pilot, in the bent
Of my affection, ready to requite
Thy late-to-me-intended benefit.
I am the roaring God of spritely wine,
Whom Semele (that did even Jove incline
To amorous mixture, and was Cadmus’ care)
Made issue to the mighty Thunderer.”
And thus, all excellence of grace to thee,
Son of sweet-count’nance-carry’ng Semele.
I must not thee forget in least degree,
But pray thy spirit to render so my song
Sweet, and all ways in order’d fury strong.

A Hymn to Mars

Mars, most-strong, gold-helm’d, making chariots crack;
Never without a shield cast on thy back;
Mind-master, town-guard, with darts never driven;
Strong-handed, all arms, fort, and fence of heaven;
Father of victory with fair strokes given;
Joint surrogate of justice, lest she fall
In unjust strifes a tyrant; general
Only of just men justly; that dost bear
Fortitude’s sceptre, to heaven’s fiery sphere
Giver of circular motion, between
That and the Pleiads that still wand’ring been,
Where thy still-vehemently-flaming horse
About the third heaven make their fiery course;
Helper of mortals; hear!—As thy fires give
The fair and present boldnesses that strive
In youth for honour, being the sweet-beam’d light
That darts into their lives, from all their height,
The fortitudes and fortunes found in fight;
So would I likewise wish to have the pow’r
To keep off from my head thy bitter hour,
And that false fire, cast from my soul’s low kind,
Stoop to the fit rule of my highest mind,
Controlling that so eager sting of wrath
That stirs me on still to that horrid scathe
Of war, that God still sends to wreak his spleen
(Even by whole tribes) of proud injurious men.
But O thou Ever-Blessed! give me still
Presence of mind to put in act my will,
Varied, as fits, to all occasion;
And to live free, unforc’d, unwrought upon,
Beneath those laws of peace that never are
Affected with pollutions popular
Of unjust hurt, or loss to anyone;
And to bear safe the burthen undergone
Of foes inflexive, and inhuman hates,
Secure from violent and harmful fates.

A Hymn to Diana

Diana praise, Muse, that in darts delights,
Lives still a maid, and had nutritial rights
With her born-brother, the far-shooting Sun.
That doth her all-of-gold-made chariot run
In chase of game, from Meles that abounds
In black-brow’d bulrushes, and, where her hounds
She first uncouples, joining there her horse,
Through Smyrna carried in most fiery course
To grape-rich Claros; where (ill his rich home,
And constant expectation She will come)
Sits Phœbus, that the silver bow doth bear,
To meet with Phœbe, that doth darts transfer
As far as He his shafts. As far then be
Thy chaste fame shot, O Queen of archery!
Sacring my song to every Deity.

A Hymn to Venus (Third Hymn)

To Cyprian Venus still my verses vow,
Who gifts as sweet as honey doth bestow
On all mortality; that ever smiles,
And rules a face that all foes reconciles;
Ever sustaining in her hand a flow’r
That all desire keeps ever in her pow’r.

Hail, then, O Queen of well-built Salamine,
And all the state that Cyprus doth confine,
Inform my song with that celestial fire
That in thy beauties kindles all desire.
So shall my Muse for ever honour thee,
And any other thou commend’st to me.

A Hymn to Pallas

Pallas Minerva only I begin
To give my song; that makes war’s terrible din,
Is patroness of cities, and with Mars
Marshall’d in all the care and cure of wars,
And in everted cities, fights, and cries.
But never doth herself set down or rise
Before a city, but at both times She
All injur’d people sets on foot and free.
Give, with thy war’s force, fortune then to me,
And, with thy wisdom’s force, felicity.

A Hymn to Juno

Saturnia, and her throne of gold, I sing,
That was of Rhea the eternal spring,
And empress of a beauty never yet
Equall’d in height of tincture. Of the great
Saturnius (breaking air in awful noise)
The far-fam’d wife and sister; whom in joys
Of high Olympus all the Blessed love,
And honour equal with unequall’d Jove.

A Hymn to Ceres

The rich-hair’d Ceres I assay to sing;
A Goddess, in whose grace the natural spring
Of serious majesty itself is seen;
And of the wedded, yet in grace still green,
Proserpina, her daughter, that displays
A beauty casting every way her rays.
All honour to thee, Goddess! Keep this town;
And take thou chief charge of my song’s renown!

A Hymn to the Mother of the Gods

Mother of all, both Gods and men, commend,
O Muse, whose fair form did from Jove descend;
That doth with cymbal sounds delight her life,
And tremulous divisions of the fife;
Love’s dreadful lions’ roars, and wolves’ hoarse howls,
Sylvan retreats, and hills, whose hollow knolls
Raise repercussive sounds about her ears.
And so may honour ever crown thy years
With all-else Goddesses, and ever be
Exalted in the Muses’ harmony!

A Hymn to Lion-Hearted Hercules

Alcides, forcefullest of all the brood
Of men enforc’d with need of earthy food,
My Muse shall memorise; the son of Jove,
Whom, in fair-seated Thebes (commix’d in love
With great heaven’s sable-cloud-assembling State)
Alcmena bore to him; and who, in date
Of days forepast, through all the sea was sent,
And Earth’s inenarrable continent,
To acts that king Eurystheus had decreed;
Did many a petulant and imperious deed
Himself, and therefore suffer’d many a toil;
Yet now inhabits the illustrious soil
Of white Olympus, and delights his life
With still-young Hebe, his well-ankled wife.
Hail, King, and Son of Jove! Vouchsafe me
Virtue, and, her effect, felicity!

A Hymn to Æsculapius

With Æsculapius, the physician,
That cur’d all sickness, and was Phœbus’ son,
My Muse makes entry; to whose life gave yield
Divine Coronis in the Dotian field,
(King Phlegius’ daughter) who much joy on men
Conferr’d, in dear ease of their irksome pain.
For which, my salutation, worthy king,
And vows to thee paid, ever when I sing!

A Hymn to Castor and Pollux

Castor and Pollux, the Tyndarides,
Sweet Muse illustrate; that their essences
Fetch from the high forms of Olympian Jove,
And were the fair fruits of bright Leda’s love,
Which she produc’d beneath the sacred shade
Of steep Taygetus, being subdu’d, and made
To serve th’ affections of the Thunderer.
And so all grace to you, whom all aver
(For skill in horses, and their manage given)
To be the bravest horsemen under heaven!

A Hymn to Mercury

Hermes I honour, the Cyllenian Spy,
King of Cyllenia, and of Arcady
With flocks abounding; and the Messenger
Of all th’ Immortals, that doth still infer
Profits of infinite value to their store;
Whom to Saturnius bashful Maia bore,
Daughter of Atlas, and did therefore fly
Of all th’ Immortals the society,
To that dark cave, where, in the dead of night,
Jove join’d with her in love’s divine delight,
When golden sleep shut Juno’s jealous eye,
Whose arms had wrists as white as ivory,
From whom, and all, both men and Gods beside,
The fair-hair’d nymph had scape kept undescried.
Joy to the Jove-got then, and Maia’s care,
’Twixt men and Gods the general Messenger,
Giver of good grace, gladness, and the flood
Of all that men or Gods account their good!

A Hymn to Pan

Sing, Muse, this chief of Hermes’ love-got joys,
Goat-footed, two-horn’d, amorous of noise,
That through the fair greens, all adorn’d with trees,
Together goes with Nymphs, whose nimble knees
Can every dance foot, that affect to scale
The most inaccessible tops of all
Uprightest rocks, and ever use to call
On Pan, the bright-hair’d God of pastoral;
Who yet is lean and loveless, and doth owe
By lot all loftiest mountains crown’d with snow;
All tops of hills, and cliffy highnesses,
All sylvan copses, and the fortresses
Of thorniest queaches, here and there doth rove,
And sometimes, by allurement of his love,
Will wade the wat’ry softnesses. Sometimes
(In quite oppos’d capriccios) he climbs
The hardest rocks, and highest, every way
Running their ridges. Often will convey
Himself up to a watch-tow’r’s top, where sheep
Have their observance. Oft through hills as steep
His goats he runs upon, and never rests.
Then turns he head, and flies on savage beasts,
Mad of their slaughters; so most sharp an eye
Setting upon them, as his beams let fly
Through all their thickest tapistries. And then
(When Hesp’rus calls to fold the flocks of men)
From the green clossets of his loftiest reeds
He rushes forth, and joy with song he feeds.
When, under shadow of their motions set,
He plays a verse forth so profoundly sweet,
As not the bird that in the flow’ry spring,
Amidst the leaves set, makes the thickets ring
Of her sour sorrows, sweeten’d with her song,
Runs her divisions varied so and strong.
And then the sweet-voic’d Nymphs that crown his mountains
(Flock’d round about the deep-black-water’d fountains)
Fall in with their contention of song.
To which the echoes all the hills along
Their repercussions add. Then here and there
(Plac’d in the midst) the God the guide doth bear
Of all their dances, winding in and out,
A lynce’s hide, besprinkled round about
With blood, cast on his shoulders. And thus He,
With well-made songs, maintains th’ alacrity
Of his free mind, in silken meadows crown’d
With hyacinths and saffrons, that abound
In sweet-breath’d odours, that th’ unnumber’d grass
(Besides their scents) give as through all they pass.
And these, in all their pleasures, ever raise
The blessed Gods’ and long Olympus’ praise:
Like zealous Hermes, who of all I said
Most profits up to all the Gods convey’d.
Who, likewise, came into th’ Arcadian state,
(That’s rich in fountains, and all celebrate
For nurse of flocks,) where He had vow’d a grove
(Surnam’d Cyllenius) to his Godhead’s love.
Yet even himself (although a God he were)
Clad in a squalid sheepskin, govern’d there
A mortal’s sheep. For soft love ent’ring him
Conform’d his state to his conceited trim,
And made him long, in an extreme degree,
T’ enjoy the fair-hair’d virgin Dryope.
Which ere he could, she made consummate
The flourishing rite of Hymen’s honour’d state;
And brought him such a piece of progeny
As show’d, at first sight, monstrous to the eye,
Goat-footed, two-horn’d, full of noise even then,
And (opposite quite to other childeren)
Told, in sweet laughter, he ought death no tear.
Yet straight his mother start, and fled, in fear,
The sight of so unsatisfying a thing,
In whose face put forth such a bristled spring.
Yet the most useful Mercury embrac’d,
And took into his arms, his homely-fac’d,
Beyond all measure joyful with his sight;
And up to heaven with him made instant flight,
Wrapp’d in the warm skin of a mountain hare,
Set him by Jove, and made most merry fare
To all the Deities else with his son’s sight;
Which most of all fill’d Bacchus with delight;
And Pan they call’d him, since he brought to all
Of mirth so rare and full a festival.
And thus all honour to the shepherds’ King,
For sacrifice to thee my Muse shall sing!

A Hymn to Vulcan

Praise Vulcan, now Muse; whom fame gives the prize
For depth and fracture of all forge-devise;
Who, with the sky-ey’d Pallas, first did give
Men rules of buildings, that before did live
In caves and dens, and hills, like savage beasts;
But now, by art-fam’d Vulcan’s interests
In all their civil industries, ways clear
Through th’ all-things-bringing-to-their-ends (the year)
They work out to their ages’ ends, at ease
Lodg’d in safe roofs from Winter’s utmost prease.
But, Vulcan, stand propitious to me,
Virtue safe granting, and felicity!

A Hymn to Phœbus

O Phœbus! Even the swan from forth her wings,
Jumping her proyning-bank, thee sweetly sings,
By bright Peneus’ whirl-pit-making streams.
Thee, that thy lute mak’st sound so to thy beams,
Thee, first and last, the sweet-voic’d singer still
Sings, for thy song’s all-songs-transcending skill.
Thy pleasure, then, shall my song still supply,
And so salutes thee King of Poesy.

A Hymn to Neptune

Neptune, the mighty marine God, I sing,
Earth’s mover, and the fruitless ocean’s King,
That Helicon and th’ Ægean deeps dost hold.
O thou Earth-shaker! Thy command two-fold
The Gods have sorted; making thee of horses
The awful tamer, and of naval forces
The Sure preserver. Hail, O Saturn’s birth!
Whose graceful green hair circles all the earth.
Bear a benign mind; and thy helpful hand
Lend all submitted to thy dread command.

A Hymn to Jove

Jove now I sing, the greatest and the best
Of all these Pow’rs that are with Deity blest,
That far-off doth his dreadful voice diffuse,
And, being King of all, doth all conduce
To all their ends. Who (shut from all Gods else
With Themis, that the laws of all things tells)
Their fit composures to their times doth call,
Weds them together, and preserves this all.
Grace then, O far-heard Jove, the grace thou’st given,
Most Glorious, and most Great of Earth and Heaven!

A Hymn to Vesta

Vesta, that as a servant oversees
King Phœbus’ hallow’d house, in all degrees
Of guide about it, on the sacred shore
Of heavenly Pythos, and hast evermore
Rich balms distilling from thy odorous hair,
Grace this house with thy housewifely repair!
Enter, and bring a mind that most may move,
Conferring even, the great in counsels, Jove;
And let my verse taste of your either’s love.

A Hymn to the Muses and Apollo

The Muses, Jove, and Phœbus, now I sing;
For from the far-off-shooting Phœbus spring
All poets and musicians, and from Jove
Th’ ascents of kings. The man the Muses love,
Felicity blesses; elocution’s choice
In syrup lay’ng of sweetest breath his voice.
Hail, Seed of Jove, my song your honours give,
And so in mine shall yours and others’ live.

A Hymn to Bacchus

Ivy-crown’d Bacchus iterate in thy praises,
O Muse; whose voice all loftiest echoes raises,
And he with all th’ illustrious Seed of Jove
Is join’d in honour, being the fruit of love
To him, and Semele the-great-in-graces;
And from the King his father’s kind embraces
By fair-hair’d Nymphs was taken to the dales
Of Nyssa, and with curious festivals
Given his fair grought, far from his father’s view,
In caves from whence eternal odours flew,
And in high number of the Deities plac’d.
Yet when the many-hymn-given God had past
His Nurses’ cares, in ivies and in bays
All over thicketed, his varied ways
To sylvan coverts evermore He took,
With all his Nurses, whose shrill voices shook
Thickets, in which could no foot’s entry fall,
And he himself made captain of them all.
And so, O grape-abounding Bacchus, be
Ever saluted by my Muse and me!
Give us to spend with spirit our hours out here,
And every hour extend to many a year.

A Hymn to Diana

Diana, that the golden spindle moves,
And lofty sounds as well as Bacchus loves,
A bashful virgin, and of fearful hearts
The death-affecter with delighted darts,
By sire and mother Phœbus’ sister born,
Whose thigh the golden falchion doth adorn,
I sing; who likewise over hills of shade
And promontories that vast winds invade,
Amorous of hunting, bends her all-gold bow,
And sigh-begetting arrows doth bestow
In fates so dreadful that the hill-tops quake,
And bristled woods their leafy foreheads shake,
Horrors invade earth, and [the] fishy seas
Impassion’d furies; nothing can appease
The dying brays of beasts. And her delight
In so much death affects so with affright
Even all inanimate natures; for, while she
Her sports applies, their general progeny
She all ways turns upon to all their banes.
Yet when her fiery pleasures find their wanes,
Her yielding bow unbent, to th’ ample house,
Seated in Delphos, rich and populous,
Of her dear brother, her retreats advance.
Where th’ instauration of delightsome dance
Amongst the Muses and the Graces she
Gives form; in which herself the regency
(Her unbent bow hung up, and casting on
A gracious robe) assumes, and first sets gone
The dances’ entry; to which all send forth
Their heavenly voices, and advance the worth
Of her fair-ankled mother, since to light
She children brought the far most exquisite
In counsels and performances of all
The Goddesses that grace the heavenly hall.
Hail then, Latona’s fair-hair’d Seed, and Jove’s!
My song shall ever call to mind your loves.

A Hymn to Pallas

Pallas-Minerva’s deity, the renown’d,
My Muse in her variety must resound;
Mighty in councils; whose illustrous eyes
In all resemblance represent the skies.
A reverend maid of an inflexible mind;
In spirit and person strong; of triple kind;
Fautress of cities that just laws maintain;
Of Jove, the-great-in-councils, very brain
Took prime existence, his unbounded brows
Could not contain her, such impetuous throes
Her birth gave way to, that abroad she flew,
And stood, in gold arm’d, in her Father’s view,
Shaking her sharp lance. All Olympus shook
So terribly beneath her, that it took
Up in amazes all the Deities there.
All earth resounded with vociferous fear.
The sea was put up all in purple waves,
And settled suddenly her rudest raves.
Hyperion’s radiant son his swift-hov’d steeds
A mighty time stay’d, till her arming weeds,
As glorious as the Gods’, the blue-ey’d Maid
Took from her deathless shoulders; but then stay’d
All these distempers, and heaven’s counsellor, Jove,
Rejoic’d that all things else his stay could move.
So I salute thee still; and still in praise
Thy fame, and others’, shall my memory raise.

A Hymn to Vesta and Mercury

Vesta I sing, who, in bequest of fate,
Art sorted out an everlasting state
In all th’ Immortals’ high-built roofs, and all
Those of earth-dwelling men, as general
And ancient honours given thee for thy gift
Of free-liv’d chastity, and precious thrift.
Nor can there amongst mortals banquets be,
In which, both first and last, they give not thee
Their endless gratitudes in pour’d-out wine,
As gracious sacrifice to thy divine
And useful virtues; being invok’d by all,
Before the least taste of their festival
In wine or food affect their appetites.
And Thou, that of th’ adorn’d-with-all-delights
Art the most useful angel, born a God
Of Jove and Maia, of heaven’s golden rod
The sole sustainer, and hast pow’r to bless
With all good all men, great Argicides,
Inhabit all good houses, see’ng no wants
Of mutual minds’ love in th’ inhabitants,
Join in kind blessing with the bashful maid
And all-lov’d virgin, Vesta; either’s aid
Combin’d in every hospitable house;
Both being best seen in all the gracious
House-works of mortals. Jointly follow then,
Even from their youths, the minds of dames and men.
Hail then, old Daughter of the oldest God,
And thou Great Bearer of Heaven’s golden rod!
Yet not to you alone my vows belong,
Others as well claim th’ homage of my song.

A Hymn to Earth, the Mother of All

Mother of all things, the well-founded Earth,
My Muse shall memorize; who all the birth
Gives food that all her upper regions breed,
All that in her divine diffusions feed
In under continents, all those that live
In all the seas, and all the air doth give
Wing’d expeditions, of thy bounties eat;
Fair children, and fair fruits, thy labour’s sweat,
O great in reverence; and referr’d to thee,
For life and death is all the pedigree
Of mortal humans. Happy then is he
Whom the innate propensions of thy mind
Stand bent to honour. He shall all things find
In all abundance; all his pastures yield
Herds in all plenties; all his roofs are fill’d
With rich possessions; he, in all the sway
Of laws best order’d, cuts out his own way
In cities shining with delicious dames,
And takes his choice of all those striving flames;
High happiness and riches, like his train,
Follow his fortunes, with delights that reign
In all their princes; glory invests his sons;
His daughters, with their crown’d selections
Of all the city, frolic through the meads,
And everyone her call’d-for dances treads
Along the soft-flow’r of the claver-grass.
All this, with all those, ever comes to pass,
That thy love blesses, Goddess full of grace,
And treasurous Angel t’ all the human race.
Hail, then, Great Mother of the Deified Kind,
Wife to the cope of stars! Sustain a mind
Propitious to me for my praise, and give
(Answering my mind) my vows fit means to live.

A Hymn to the Sun

The radiant Sun’s divine renown diffuse,
Jove’s daughter, great Calliope, my Muse;
Whom ox-ey’d Euryphaëssa gave birth
To the bright Seed of starry Heaven and Earth.
For the far-fam’d Hyperion took to wife
His sister Euryphaëssa, that life
Of his high race gave to these lovely three:
Aurora, with the rosy-wrists; and She
That owns th’ enamouring tresses, the bright Moon;
Together with the never-wearied Sun,
Who (his horse mounting) gives both mortals light
And all th’ Immortals. Even to horror, bright
A blaze burns from his golden burgonet,
Which to behold exceeds the sharpest set
Of any eye’s intention, beams so clear
It all ways pours abroad. The glorious cheer
Of his far-shining face up to his crown
Casts circular radiance, that comes streaming down
About his temples, his bright cheeks, and all,
Retaining the refulgence of their fall.
About his bosom flows so fine a weed
As doth the thinness of the wind exceed
In rich context; beneath whose deep folds fly
His masculine horses round about the sky,
Till in this hemisphere he renders stay
T’ his gold-yok’d coach and coursers; and his way,
Let down by heaven, the heavenly coachman makes
Down to the ocean, where his rest he takes.
My salutations then, fair King, receive,
And in propitious returns relieve
My life with mind-fit means; and then from thee,
And all the race of complete Deity,
My song shall celebrate those half-god States,
That yet sad death’s condition circulates,
And whose brave acts the Gods show men that they
As brave may aim at, since they can but die.

A Hymn to the Moon

The Moon, now, Muses, teach me to resound,
Whose wide wings measure such a world of ground;
Jove’s daughter, deck’d with the mellifluous tongue,
And seen in all the sacred art of song.
Whose deathless brows when she from heaven displays,
All earth she wraps up in her orient rays.
A heaven of ornament in earth is rais’d
When her beams rise. The subtle air is sais’d
Of delicate splendour from her crown of gold.
And when her silver bosom is extoll’d,
Wash’d in the ocean, in day’s equall’d noon
Is midnight seated; but when she puts on
Her far-off-sprinkling-lustre evening weeds,
(The month is two cut; her high-breasted steeds
Man’d all with curl’d flames, put in coach and all,
Her huge orb fill’d,) her whole trims then exhale
Unspeakable splendours from the glorious sky.
And out of that state mortal men imply
Many predictions. And with her then,
In love mix’d, lay the King of Gods and men;
By whom made fruitful, she Pandea bore,
And added her state to th’ Immortal Store.
Hail, Queen, and Goddess, th’ ivory-wristed Moon
Divine, prompt, fair-hair’d! With thy grace begun,
My Muse shall forth, and celebrate the praise
Of men whose states the Deities did raise
To semi-deities; whose deeds t’ endless date
Muse-lov’d and sweet-sung poets celebrate.

A Hymn to Castor and Pollux

Jove’s fair Sons, father’d by th’ Oebalian king,
Muses well-worth-all men’s beholdings, sing!
The dear birth that bright-ankl’d Leda bore;
Horse-taming Castor, and, the conqueror
Of tooth-tongu’d Momus, Pollux; whom beneath
Steep-brow’d Taygetus she gave half-god breath,
In love mix’d with the black-clouds King of Heaven;
Who, both of men and ships, being tempest driven,
When Winter’s wrathful empire is in force
Upon th’ implacable seas, preserve the course.
For when the gusts begin, if near the shore,
The seamen leave their ship, and, evermore
Bearing two milk-white lambs aboard, they now
Kill them ashore, and to Jove’s issue vow,
When though their ship, in height of all the roar
The winds and waves confound, can live no more
In all their hopes, then suddenly appear
Jove’s saving Sons, who both their bodies bear
’Twixt yellow wings down from the sparkling pole,
Who straight the rage of those rude winds control,
And all the high-waves couch into the breast
Of th’ hoary seas. All which sweet signs of rest
To seamen’s labours their glad souls conceive,
And end to all their irksome grievance give.
So, once more, to the swift-horse-riding race
Of royal Tyndarus, eternal grace!

A Hymn to Men of Hospitality

Reverence a man with use propitious
That hospitable rites wants; and a house
(You of this city with the seat of state
To ox-ey’d Juno vow’d) yet situate
Near Pluto’s region. At the extreme base
Of whose so high-hair’d city, from the race
Of blue-wav’d Hebrus lovely fluent, grac’d
With Jove’s begetting, you divine cups taste.

EPIGRAMS AND OTHER POEMS

To Cuma

Lend hospitable rites and house-respect,
You that the virgin with the fair eyes deckt
Make fautress of your stately-seated town,
At foot of Sardes, with the high-hair’d crown,
Inhabiting rich Cuma; where ye taste
Of Hermus’ heavenly fluent, all embrac’d
By curl’d-head whirl pits; and whose waters move
From the divine seed of immortal Jove.

In his Return to Cuma

Swiftly my feet sustain me to the town,
Where men inhabit whom due honours crown,
Whose minds with free-given faculties are mov’d,
And whose grave counsels best of best approv’d.

Upon the Sepulchre of Midus Cut in Brass, in the Figure of a Virgin

A maid of brass I am, infixed here
T’ eternize honest Midus’ sepulchre;
And while the stream her fluent seed receives,
And steep trees curl their verdant brows with leaves,
While Phœbus rais’d above the earth gives sight,
And th’ humorous Moon takes lustre from his light,
While floods bear waves, and seas shall wash the shore,
At this his sepulchre, whom all deplore,
I’ll constantly abide; all passers by
Informing, “Here doth honest Midus lie.”

Cuma, refusing to eternize their State, Though Brought Thither by the Muses

O to what fate hath Father Jove given o’er
My friendless life, born ever to be poor!
While in my infant state he pleas’d to save me,
Milk on my reverend mother’s knees he gave me,
In delicate and curious nursery;
Æolian Smyrna, seated near the sea,
(Of glorious empire, and whose bright sides
Sacred Meletus’ silver current glides,)
Being native seat to me. Which, in the force
Of far-past time, the breakers of wild horse,
Phriconia’s noble nation, girt with tow’rs;
Whose youth in fight put on with fiery pow’rs,
From hence, the Muse-maids, Jove’s illustrous Seed,
Impelling me, I made impetuous speed,
And went with them to Cuma, with intent
T’ eternize all the sacred continent
And state of Cuma. They, in proud ascent
From off their bench, refus’d with usage fierce
The sacred voice which I aver is verse.
Their follies, yet, and madness borne by me,
Shall by some pow’r be thought on futurely,
To wreak of him whoever, whose tongue sought
With false impair my fall. What fate God brought
Upon my birth I’ll bear with any pain,
But undeserv’d defame unfelt sustain.
Nor feels my person (dear to me though poor)
Any great lust to linger any more
In Cuma’s holy highways; but my mind
(No thought impair’d, for cares of any kind
Borne in my body) rather vows to try
The influence of any other sky,
And spirits of people bred in any land
Of ne’er so slender and obscure command.

An Essay of his begun Iliads

Ilion, and all the brave-horse-breeding soil,
Dardania, I sing; that many a toil
Impos’d upon the mighty Grecian pow’rs,
Who were of Mars the manly servitours.

To Thestor’s Son[1] inquisitive about the Causes of Things

Thestorides! of all the skills unknown
To errant mortals, there remains not one
Of more inscrutable affair to find
Than is the true state of a human mind.

[1] Homer intimated, in this his answer to Thestorides, a will to have him learn the knowledge of himself, before he inquired so curiously the causes of other things. And from hence had the great peripatetic, Themistius, his most grave epiphoneme, Anima quæ seipsam ignorat, quid sciret ipsa de aliis? And, therefore, according to Aristotle, advises all philosophical students to begin with that study.

To Neptune

Hear, pow’rful Neptune, that shak’st earth in ire,
King of the great green, where dance all the quire
Of fair-hair’d Helicon; give prosperous gales;
And good pass, to these guiders of our sails,
Their voyage rend’ring happily directed,
And their return with no ill fate affected.
Grant likewise at rough Mimas’ lowest roots,
Whose strength up to her tops prærupt rocks shoots,
My passage safe arrival; and that I
My bashful disposition may apply
To pious men, and wreak myself upon
The man whose verbal circumvention
In me did wrong t’ hospitious Jove’s whole state,
And th’ hospitable table violate.

To the City of Erythræa

Worshipful Earth, Giver of all things good!
Giver of even felicity; whose flood
The mind all-over steeps in honeydew;
That to some men dost infinite kindness shew,
To others that despise thee art a shrew,
And giv’st them gamester’s galls; who, once their main
Lost with an ill chance, fare like abjects slain.

To Mariners

Ye wave-trod watermen, as ill as she
That all the earth in infelicity
Of rapine plunges; who upon your fare
As sterv’d-like-ravenous as cormorants are;
The lives ye lead, but in the worst degree,
Not to be envied more than misery;
Take shame, and fear the indignation
Of Him that thunders from the highest throne,
Hospitious Jove, who, at the back, prepares
Pains of abhorr’d effect of him that dares
The pieties break of his hospitious squares.

The Pine

Any tree else bears better fruit than thee,
That Ida’s tops sustain, where every tree
Bears up in air such perspirable heights,
And in which caves and sinuous receipts
Creep in such great abundance. For about
Thy foots, that ever all thy fruits put out,
As nourish’d by them, equal with thy fruits,
Pour Mars’s iron-mines their accurs’d pursuits.
So that when any earth-encroaching man,
Of all the martial brood Cebrenian,
Plead need of iron, they are certain still
About thy roots to satiate every will.

To Glaucus,
Who was so Miserably Sparing that he Feared All Men’s Access to Him

Glaucus! though wise enough, yet one word more
Let my advice add to thy wisdom’s store,
For ’twill be better so: Before thy door
Give still thy mastiffs meat, that will be sure
To lie there, therefore, still, and not endure
(With waylaid ears) the softest foot can fall,
But men and beasts make fly thee and thy stall.

Against the Samian Ministress or Nun

Hear me, O Goddess, that invoke thine ear,
Thou that dost feed and form the youthful year,
And grant that this dame may the loves refuse,
And beds, of young men, and affect to use
Humans whose temples hoary hairs distain,
Whose pow’rs are passing coy, whose wills would fain.

Written on the Council Chamber

Of men, sons are the crowns of cities’ tow’rs;
Of pastures, horse are the most beauteous flow’rs;
Of seas, ships are the grace; and money still
With trains and titles doth the family fill.
But royal counsellors, in council set,
Are ornaments past all, as clearly great
As houses are that shining fires enfold,
Superior far to houses nak’d and cold.

The Furnace called in to sing by Potters

If ye deal freely, O my fiery friends,
As ye assure, I’ll sing, and serve your ends.
Pallas, vouchsafe thou here invok’d access, I
Impose thy hand upon this Forge, and bless
All cups these artists earn so, that they may
Look black still with their depth, and every way
Give all their vessels a most sacred sale.
Make all well-burn’d; and estimation call
Up to their prices. Let them market well,
And in all highways in abundance sell,
Till riches to their utmost wish arise,
And, as thou mak’st them rich, so make me wise.
But if ye now turn all to impudence,
And think to pay with lies my patience,
Then will I summon ’gainst your Furnace all
Hell’s harmfull’st spirits; Maragus I’ll call,
Sabactes, Asbett, and Omadamus,
Who ills against your art innumerous
Excogitates, supplies, and multiplies.
Come, Pallas, then, and all command to rise,
Infesting forge and house with fire, till all
Tumble together, and to ashes fall,
These potters selves dissolv’d in tears as small.
And as a horse-cheek chides his foaming bit,
So let this Forge murmur in fire and flit,
And all this stuff to ashy ruins run.
And thou, O Circe, daughter of the Sun,
Great-many-poison-mixer, come, and pour
Thy cruell’st poisons on this Potters’ floor,
Shivering their vessels; and themselves affect
With all the mischiefs possible to direct
’Gainst all their beings, urg’d by all thy fiends.
Let Chiron likewise come; and all those friends
(The Centaurs) that Alcides’ fingers fled,
And all the rest too that his hand strook dead,
(Their ghosts excited) come, and macerate
These earthen men; and yet with further fate
Affect their Furnace; all their tear-burst eyes
Seeing and mourning for their miseries,
While I look on, and laugh their blasted art
And them to ruin. Lastly, if apart
Any lies lurking, and sees yet, his face
Into a coal let th’ angry fire embrace,
That all may learn by them, in all their lust,
To dare deeds great, to see them great and just.

Eiresione, or the Olive Branch

The turrets of a man of infinite might,
Of infinite action, substance infinite,
We make access to; whose whole being rebounds
From earth to heaven, and nought but bliss resounds.
Give entry then, ye doors; more riches yet
Shall enter with me; all the Graces met
In joy of their fruition, perfect peace
Confirming all; all crown’d with such increase,
That every empty vessel in your house
May stand replete with all things precious;
Elaborate Ceres may your larders fill
With all dear delicates, and serve in still;
May for your son a wife make wish’d approach
Into your tow’rs, and rapt in in her coach
With strong-kneed mules; may yet her state prove staid,
With honour’d housewiferies; her fair hand laid
To artful loomworks; and her nak’d feet tread
The gum of amber to a golden bead.
But I’ll return; return, and yet not press
Your bounties now assay’d with oft access,
Once a year only, as the swallow prates
Before the wealthy Spring’s wide open gates.
Meantime I stand at yours, nor purpose stay
More time t’ entreat. Give, or not give, away
My feet shall bear me, that did never come
With any thought to make your house my home.

To certain Fisher-Boys
pleasing him with Ingenious Riddles

Yet from the bloods even of your self-like sires
Are you descended, that could make ye heirs
To no huge hoards of coin, nor leave ye able
To feed flocks of innumerable rabble.

THE END OF ALL THE ENDLESS WORKS OF HOMER.

The Translator’s Epilogue

The work that I was born to do is done!
Glory to Him that the conclusion
Makes the beginning of my life; and never
Let me be said to live, till I live ever.
Where’s the outliving of my fortunes then,
Ye errant vapours of Fame’s Lernean fen,
That, like possess’d storms, blast all not in herd
With your abhorr’d heads; who, because cashier’d
By men for monsters, think men monsters all,
That are not of your pied Hood and your Hall,
When you are nothing but the scum of things,
And must be cast off; drones, that have no stings;
Nor any more soul than a stone hath wings?
Avaunt, ye hags! Your hates and scandals are
The crowns and comforts of a good man’s care;
By whose impartial perpendicular,
All is extuberance, and excretion all,
That you your ornaments and glories call.
Your wry mouths censure right! Your blister’d tongues,
That lick but itches! And whose ulcerous lungs
Come up at all things permanent and sound!
O you, like flies in dregs, in humours drown’d!
Your loves, like atoms, lost in gloomy air,
I would not retrieve with a wither’d hair.
Hate, and cast still your stings then, for your kisses
Betray but truth, and your applauds are hisses.
To see our supercilious wizards frown,
Their faces fall’n like fogs, and coming down,
Stinking the sun out, makes me shine the more;
And like a check’d flood bear above the shore,
That their profane opinions fain would set
To what they see not, know not, nor can let.
Yet then our learn’d men with their torrents come,
Roaring from their forc’d hills, all crown’d with foam,
That one not taught like them, should learn to know
Their Greek roots, and from thence the groves that grow,
Casting such rich shades from great Homer’s wings,
That first and last command the Muses’ springs.
Though he’s best scholar, that, through pains and vows
Made his own master only, all things knows.
Nor pleads my poor skill form, or learned place,
But dauntless labour, constant prayer, and grace.
And what’s all their skill, but vast varied reading?
As if broad-beaten highways had the leading
To Truth’s abstract, and narrow path, and pit;
Found in no walk of airy worldly wit.
And without Truth, all’s only sleight of hand,
Or our law-learning in a foreign land,
Embroidery spent on cobwebs, braggart show
Of men that all things learn, and nothing know.
For ostentation humble Truth still flies,
And all confederate fashionists defies.
And as some sharp-brow’d doctor, English born,
In much learn’d Latin idioms can adorn
A verse with rare attractions, yet become
His English Muse like an Arachnean loom,
Wrought spite of Pallas, and therein bewrays
More tongue than truth, begs, and adopts his bays;
So Ostentation, be he never so
Larded with labour to suborn his show,
Shall sooth within him but a bastard soul,
No more heaven heiring than, Earth’s son, the mole,
But as in dead calms emptiest smokes arise,
Uncheck’d and free, up straight into the skies;
So drowsy Peace, that in her humour steeps
All she affects, lets such rise while she sleeps.
Many, and most men, have of wealth least store,
But none the gracious shame that fits the poor.
So most learn’d men enough are ignorant,
But few the grace have to confess their want,
Till lives and learnings come concomitant.
Far from men’s knowledges their lives’-acts flow;
Vainglorious acts then vain prove all they know.
As night the life-inclining stars best shows,
So lives obscure the starriest souls disclose.
For me, let just men judge by what I show
In acts expos’d how much I err or know;
And let not envy make all worse than nought,
With her mere headstrong and quite brainless thought,
Others, for doing nothing, giving all,
And bounding all worth in her bursten gall.
God and my dear Redeemer rescue me
From men’s immane and mad impiety,
And by my life and soul (sole known to Them)
Make me of palm, or yew, an anadem.
And so my sole God, the Thrice-Sacred-Trine,
Bear all th’ ascription of all me and mine.

Supplico tibi, Domine, Pater, et Dux rationis nostræ, ut nostræ nobilitatis recordemur quâ Tu nos ornasti; et ut Tu nobis præstó sis, ut iis qui per sese moventur; ut et à corporis contagio, brutorumque affectuum, repurgemur, eosque superemus, atque regamus, et, sicut decet, pro instrumentis iis utamur. Deinde, ut nobis adjumento sis, ad accuratam rationis nostræ correctionem, et conjunctionem cum iis qui verè sunt per lucem veritatis. Et tertiùm, Salvatori supplex oro, ut ab oculis animorum nostrorum, caliginem prorsus abstergas, ut norimus bene qui Deus, aut mortalis, habendus. Amen.

Sine honore vivam, nulloque numera ero.

FINIS