Such as the souls of cowards might conceive,
And, formed like tyrants, tyrants would believe.
* * * * * * * *
Altars grew marble then, and reeked with gore;
Then first the Flamen tasted living food,
Next his grim idol smeared with human blood.
With Heaven’s own thunders shook the earth below,
And played the God an engine on his foe.”
Whenever occasion arises, Pope fails not to stigmatise the barbarity of slaughtering for food; and the sæva indignatio urges him to upbraid his fellows with the slaughter of—
“The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed,