Where art thou, Moschus, and where are we all?
Thou from high Helicon's muse-haunted hill
Advanc'd to Sion's mount celestial:
Encumber'd we with earth and sorrow still.
Before the throne thy golden lyre is strung,
Seraphic descant fills thy raptur'd mind:
On Camus' willows pale our harps are hung;
Our footsteps linger on his banks behind.
The chosen Lawgiver from Pisgah's hill,
His wond'ring eyes around in transport threw:
On earthly Canaan having gaz'd his fill,
To heavenly Canaan's glories quick withdrew.
So, nurst in sacred and in classic lore,
With varied science at its fountain fraught,
From human knowledge to th' exhaustless store
Of heaven he stole to taste the fuller draught.
What boots the beauty of the classic page,
And what philosophy's sublimer rule,
What all th' advances of maturing age,
If dies the wise man as departs the fool?
Master of Greece's thundering eloquence,
The force of Roman grace to him was known;
The well-turn'd period, join'd with manly sense:
Sage criticism mark'd him for her own.
Ah! what avails the power of harmony,
The poet's melody, the critic's skill!
The verse may live, yet must the maker die;
Such is stern Atropos's solemn will.
Sweet bard of Rhodes,[772] bright star of Egypt's court,
Whom Ptolemy's discerning bounty drew
To guard fair science in the learn'd resort,
Thy muse alone can pay the tribute due.
Thy muse, that paints Medea's frantic love,
And all the transports of the enamour'd maid,
Who dared each strongest obstacle remove,
Her reason and her art by love betray'd.
While hardy Jason ploughs old Ocean's plain,
First of the Greeks to tempt Barbarian seas,
With him we share the dangers of the main,
Nor dread the crash of the Symplegades.