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In time he vaunts among his youthful peers,
Strong-bon'd, and ftrung with nerves, in pride of years,
He runs with mettle his firft merry stage,
Maintains the next, abated of his rage,
But manages his ftrength, and spares his age.
Heavy the third, and stiff, he finks apace,

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And tho? 'tis down-hill all, but creeps along the race.
Now fapless on the verge of death he stands,
Contemplating his former feet, and hands;
And, Milo-like, his flacken'd finews fees,
And wither'd arms, once fit to cope with Hercules,
Unable now to shake, much lefs to tear, the trees.
So Helen wept when her too faithful glafs
Reflected to her eyes the ruins of her face:
Wond'ring what charms her ravishers could spy,
To force her twice, or ev'n but once enjoy!

Thy teeth, devouring time, thine, envious age,
On things below ftill exercise your rage:
With venom'd grinders you corrupt your meat,
And then, at ling'ring meals, the morfels eat.
Nor thofe, which elements we call, abide,
Nor to this figure, nor to that, are ty'd;
For this eternal world is faid of old
But four prolifick principles to hold,
Four different bodies; two to heav'n afcend,
And other two down to the centre tend:
Fire firft with wings expanded mounts on high,
Pure, void of weight, and dwells in upper fky;
Then air, because unclog'd in empty space,
Flies after fire, and claims the second place:
But weighty water, as her nature guides,
Lies on the lap of earth, and mother earth fubfides.
All things are mixt with thefe, which all contain,
And into these are all resolv'd again :
Earth rarifies to dew; expanded more
The fubtil dew in air begins to foar;

Spreads

Spreads as the flies, and weary of her name
Extenuates ftill, and changes into flame;
Thus having by degrees perfection won,
Restless they soon untwist the web they spun,
And fire begins to lose her radiant hue,
Mix'd with grofs air, and air descends to dew;
And dew condenfing, does her form forego,
And finks, a heavy lump of earth, below.
Thus are their figures never at a stand,
But chang'd by Nature's innovating hand;
All things are alter'd, nothing is deftroy'd,
The fhifted fcene for fome new fhow employ'd.
Then, to be born, is to begin to be
Some other thing we were not formerly:
And what we call to die, is not t' appear,
Or be the thing that formerly we were.
Those very elements, which we partake
Alive, when dead fome other bodies make:
Tranflated grow, have fenfe, or can difcourfe;
But death on deathlefs fubftance has no force.
That forms are chang'd I grant, that nothing can
Continue in the figure it began:

The golden age to filver was debas'd :
Το copper that; our metal came at laft.
The face of places, and their forms, decay;
And that is folid earth, that once was sea :
Seas in their turn retreating from the shore,
Make folid land, what ocean was before ;
And far from ftrands are fhells of fishes found,
And rufty anchors fix'd on mountain ground:
And what were fields before, now wash'd and worn,
By falling floods from high, to valleys turn,
And crumbling ftill defcend to level lands;
And lakes, and trembling bogs, are barren fands:
And the parch'd defart floats in ftreams unknown;
Wond'ring to drink of waters not her own.

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Here nature living fountains opes; and there Seals up the wombs where living fountains were ; Or earthquakes ftop their ancient cou fe, and bring Diverted streams to feed a diftant spring.

So Lycus, fwallow'd up, is feen no more,
But far from thence knocks out another door.
Thus Erafinus dives; and blind in earth
Runs on, and gropes his way to fecond birth,
Starts up in Argos meads, and shakes his locks
Around the fields, and fattens all the flocks.
So Myfus by another way is led,

And, grown a river, now difdains his head:
Forgets his humble birth, his name forfakes,.
And the proud title of Caicus takes.
Large Amenane, impure with yellow fands,
Runs rapid often, and as often stands ;

And here he threats the drunken fields to drown,
And there his dugs deny to give their liquor down.
Anigros once did wholsome draughts afford,
But now his deadly waters are abhorr❜d:
Since, hurt by Hercules, as fame refounds,
The Centaur in his current wash'd their wounds.
The ftreams of Hypanis are fweet no more,
But brackish lofe the taste they had before.
Antiffa, Pharos, Tyre, in feas were pent,
Once ifles, but now increase the continent;
While the Leucadian coaft, main-land before,
By rufhing feas is fever'd from the fhore.
So Zancle to th' Italian earth was ty'd,

And men once walk'd where ships at anchor ride;
Till Neptune overlook'd the narrow way,
And in difdain pour'd in the conqu❜ring fea.

Two cities that adorn'd th' Achaian ground,

Buris and Helice, no more are found,

But, whelm'd beneath a lake, are funk and drown'd; And boatsmen through the cryftal water fhow,

To wond'ring paffengers, the walls below.

Near Træzen ftands a hill, expos'd in air
To winter winds, of leafy fhadows bare:
This once was level ground: but (ftrange to tell)
Th' included vapours, that in caverns dwell,
Lab'ring with colick pangs, and clofe confin'd,
In vain fought iffue from the rumbling wind:
Yet ftill they heav'd for vent, and heaving still
Inlarg'd the concave, and fhot up the hill;
As breath extends a bladder, or the fkins
Of goats are blown t' inclose the hoarded wines:
The mountain yet retains a mountain's face,
And gather'd rubbish heals the hollow space.
Of many wonders, which I heard or knew,
Retrenching moft, I will relate but few:
What, are not springs with qualities oppos'd
Endu'd at feafons, and at feasons loft?

Thrice in a day thine, Ammon, change their form,
Cold at high noon, at morn and evening warm:
Thine, Athaman, will kindle wood, if thrown
On the pil'd earth, and in the waneing moon.
The Thracians have a stream, if any try
The taste, his harden'd bowels petrify;
Whate'er it touches it converts to ftones,
And makes a marble pavement where it runs.
Grathis, and Sibaris her fifter flood,
That flide thro' our Calabrian neighbour wood,
With gold and amber die the fhining hair,
And thither youth refort; (for who would not be fair ?)
But ftranger virtues yet in ftreams we find,
Some change not only bodies, but the mind:
Who has not heard of Salmacis obfcene,
Whofe waters into women soften men ?
Of Ethiopian lakes, which turn the brain
To madness, or in heavy fleep conftrain ?
Clytorean ftreams the love of wine expel,
(Such is the virtue of th' abftemious well,)

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Whether the colder nymph that rules the flood
Extinguishes, and balks the drunken God;
Or that Melampus (so have some affur'd)
When the mad Protides with charms he cur'd,
And pow'rful herbs, both charms and fimples caft
Into the fober spring, where till their virtues last.
Unlike effects Lynceftis will produce;

Who drinks his waters, tho' with moderate use,
Reels as with wine, and fees with double fight:
His heels too heavy, and his head too light.
Ladon, once Pheneos, an Arcadian stream,
(Ambiguous in th' effects, as in the name)
By day is wholfome bev'rage; but is thought
By night infected, and a deadly draught.

Thus running rivers, and the ftanding lake,
Now of thefe virtues, now of those partake:
Time was (and all things time and fate obey)
When faft Ortygia floated on the fea;

Such were Cyanean ifles, when Typhis fteer'd
Betwixt their ftraits, and their collifion fear'd;
They fwam where now they fit; and firmly join'd
Secure of rooting up, refift the wind,

Nor Etna vomiting fulphureous fire

Will ever belch; for fulphur will expire,

(The veins exhaufted of the liquid ftore ;)

Time was the caft no flames; in time will caft no more.

For whether earth's an animal, and air

Imbibes, her lungs with coolness to repair,
And what the fucks remits; fhe ftill requires
Inlets for air, and outlets for her fires;
When tortur'd with convulfive fits the thakes,

That motion chokes the vent, till other vent she make; ;
Or when the wind in hollow caves are clos'd,
And fubtil fpirits find that way oppos'd,
They tofs up flints in air; the flints that hide,
The feeds of fire, thus tofs'd in air, collide,

Kindling

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