Her hunger was no plea; for that she dy'd.
The goat came next in order, to be try'd:
The goat had cropt the tendrils of the vine:
In vengeance laity and clergy join,

Where one had loft his profit, one his wine.
Here was, at least, fome fhadow of offence:
The sheep was facrific'd on no pretence,
But meek and unrefifting innocence.
A patient, useful creature, born to bear
The warm and woolly fleece, that cloath'd her murderer,
And daily to give down the milk fhe bred,
A tribute for the grafs on which she fed.
Living, both food and raiment fhe fupplies,
And is of leaft advantage when she dies.

How did the toiling ox his death deserve,
A downright fimple drudge, and born to serve ?
O tyrant! with what juftice canft thou hope
The promise of the year, a plenteous crop ;
When thou destroy'ft thy lab'ring fteer, who till'd,
And plow'd, with pains, thy elfe ungrateful field?
From his yet reeking neck to draw the yoke,
That neck with which the furly clods he broke;
And to the hatchet yield thy husbandman,
Who finish'd autumn, and the spring began!
Nor this alone! but heav'n itself to bribe,
We to the Gods our impious acts afcribe:
First recompenfe with death their creature's toil,
Then call'd the bless'd above to share the spoil:
The fairest victim muft the pow'rs appease:
(So fatal 'tis sometimes too much to please!)
A purple fillet his broad brows adorns,
With flow'ry garlands crown'd, and gilded horns :
He hears the murd'rous pray'r the priest prefers,
But understands not, 'tis his doom he hears:
Beholds the meal betwixt his temples caft,
(The fruit and product of his labours paft ;)

4

And

And in the water views perhaps the knife
Uplifted, to deprive him of his life;

Then broken up alive, his entrails fees

you

Torn out, for priests t' infpect the God's decrees.
From whence, O mortal men, this guft of blood
Have you deriv'd, and interdicted food?
Be taught by me this dire delight to fhun,
Warn'd by my precepts, by my practice won :
And when you eat the well-deferving beast,
Think, on the lab'rer of your field feaft!
Now fince the God infpires me to proceed,
Be that, whate'er inspiring Pow'r, obey'd.
For I will fing of mighty myfteries,
Of truths conceal'd before from human eyes,
Dark oracles unveil, and open all the skies.
Pleas'd as I am to walk along the sphere
Of shining stars, and travel with the year,
To leave the heavy earth, and scale the height
Of Atlas, who fupports the heav'nly weight:
To look from upper light, and thence furvey
Mistaken mortals wand'ring from the way,
And wanting wisdom, fearful for the state
Of future things, and trembling at their fate!
Those I would teach; and by right reafon bring
To think of death, as but an idle thing.
Why thus affrighted at an empty name,
A dream of darkness, and fictitious flame?
Vain themes of wit, which but in poems pafs,
And fables of a world, that never was!
What feels the body when the foul expires,
By time corrupted, or confum'd by fires?
Nor dies the fpirit, but new life repeats
In other forms, and only changes feats.
Ev'n 1, who thefe myfterious truths declare,
Was once Euphorbus in the Trojan war;
My name and lineage I remember well,
And how in fight by Sparta's king I fell.

}

In Argive Juno's fane I late beheld

My buckler hung on high, and own'd my former fhield.
Then death, fo call'd, is but old matter dress'd
In some new figure, and a vary'd vest:

Thus all things are but alter'd, nothing dies;
And here and there th' unbody'd fpirit flies,
By time, or force, or fickness difpoffeft,
And lodges, where it lights, in man or beaft;
Or hunts without, till ready limbs it find,
And actuates those according to their kind;
From tenement to tenement is tofs'd;

The foul is ftill the fame, the figure only loft:
And as the foften'd wax new seals receives,
This face affumes, and that impreffion leaves;
Now call'd by one, now by another name;
The form is only chang'd, the wax is ftill the same :
So death, fo call'd, can but the form deface,
Th' immortal foul flies out in empty space;
To feek her fortune in fome other place.
Then let not piety be put to flight,
To please the tafte of glutton appetite;
But fuffer inmate fouls fecure to dwell,
Left from their feats your parents you expel;
With rabid hunger feed upon your kind,
Or from a beast diflodge a brother's mind.

And fince, like Tiphys, parting from the shore,
In ample feas I fail, and depths untry'd before,
This let me further add, that nature knows
No ftedfaft ftation, but, or ebbs, or flows:
Ever in motion; fhe deftroys her old,
And cafts new figures in another mold.
Ev'n times are in perpetual flux; and run,
Like rivers from their fountain, rolling on
For time, no more than ftreams, is at a stay :
The flying hour is ever on her way;

VOL. IV.

H

And

And as the fountain ftill fupplies her store,
The wave behind impels the wave before;
Thus in fucceffive course the minutes run,
And urge their predeceffor minutes on,
Still moving, ever new: for former things
Are fet afide, like abdicated kings:
And every moment alters what is done,
And innovates fome act till then unknown.
Darkness we fee emerges into light,

And shining funs descend to sable night;
Ev'n heav'n itself receives another die,
When weary'd animals in flumbers lie
Of midnight ease; another, when the grey
Of morn preludes the fplendour of the day.
The disk of Phoebus, when he climbs on high,
Appears at first but as a bloodshot eye;
And when his chariot downward drives to bed,
His ball is with the fame fuffufion red;
But mounted high in his meridian race
All bright he fhines, and with a better face:
For there, pure particles of æther flow,
Far from th' infection of the world below.
Nor equal light th' unequal moon adorns,
Or in her wexing, or her waning horns.
For ev'ry day she wanes, her face is lefs,
But, gath'ring into globe, she fattens at increase.
Perceiv'st thou not the process of the year,
How the four seasons in four forms appear,
Refembling human life in ev'ry fhape they wear?
Spring first, like infancy, fhoots out her head,
With milky juice requiring to be fed :
Helpless, tho' fresh, and wanting to be led.
The green ftem grows in ftature and in fize,
But only feeds with hope the farmer's eyes;
Then laughs the childish year with flow'rets crown'd,
And lavishly perfumes the fields around,

But

But no fubftantial nourishment receives,
Infirm the ftalks, unfolid are the leaves..
Proceeding onward whence the year began,
The fummer grows adult, and ripens into man.
This feafon, as in men, is most repleat
With kindly moisture, and prolifick heat.
Autumn fucceeds, a fober tepid age,
Not froze with fear, nor boiling into rage;
More than mature, and tending to decay,
When our brown locks repine to mix with odious grey.
Laft, winter creeps along with tardy pace,
Sour is his front, and furrow'd is his face.
His fcalp if not difhonour'd quite of hair,

The ragged fleece is thin, and thin is worse than bare,
Ev'n our own bodies daily change receive,
Some part of what was theirs before they leave;
Nor are to-day what yefterday they were;
Nor the whole fame to-morrow will appear,
Time was, when we were fow'd, and just began,
From fome few fruitful drops, the promife of a man ;
Then Nature's hand (fermented as it was)
Moulded to shape the foft, coagulated mass;
And when the little man was fully form'd
The breathlefs embrio with a spirit warm'd ;
But when the mother's throes begin to come,
The creature, pent within the narrow room,
Breaks his blind prifon, pufhing to repair
His ftifled breath, and draw the living air;
Caft on the margin of the world he lies,
A helpless babe, but by inftinct he cries.
He next effays to walk, but downward prefs'd
On four feet imitates his brother beast:
By flow degrees he gathers from the ground
His legs, and to the rolling chair is bound ;
Then walks alone; a horfeman now become,
He rides a stick, and travels round the room :

H z