Kindling the fulphur, till the fuel spent

The cave is cool'd, and the fierce winds relent.
Or whether fulphur, catching fire, feeds on
Its unctuous parts, till all the matter gone
The flames no more afcend; for earth supplies
The fat that feeds them; and when earth denies
That food, by length of time confum'd, the fire
Famish'd for want of fuel muft expire.

A race of men there are, as fame has told,
Who fhiv'ring fuffer Hyperborean cold,
Till nine times bathing in Minerva's lake,
Soft feathers to defend their naked fides they take.
'Tis faid, the Scythian wives (believe who will)
Transform themselves to birds by magic skill;
Smear'd over with an oil of wond'rous might,
That adds new pinions to their airy flight.
But this by fure experiment we know,
That living creatures from corruption grow:
Hide in a hollow pit a flaughter'd fteer,
Bees from his putrid bowels will appear;

Who like their parents haunt the fields, and bring
Their honey-harvest home, and hope another spring.
The warlike fteed is multiply'd, we find,
To wafps and hornets of the warriour kind.
Cut from a crab his crooked claws, and hide
The reft in earth, a fcorpion thence will glide.
And shoot his fting, his tail in circles tofs'd
Refers the limbs his backward father loft.
And worms, that ftretch on leaves their filmy loom,
Crawl from their bags, and butterflies become.
Ev'n flime begets the frog's loquacious race:
Short of their feet at firft, in little space

With arms and legs endu'd, long leaps they take,
Rais'd on their hinder part, and swim the lake,
And waves repel for nature gives their kind,
To that intent, a length of legs behind.

4

The

The cubs of bears a living lump appear,
When whelp'd, and no determin'd figure wear.
Their mother licks 'em into fhape, and gives
As much of form, as the herself receives.
The grubs from their fexangular abode
Crawl out unfinish'd, like the maggot's brood:
Trunks without limbs; till time at leifure brings
The thighs they wanted, and their tardy wings.
The bird who draws the car of Juno, vain
Of her crown'd head, and of her starry train;
And he that bears th' artillery of Jove,

The ftrong-pounc'd eagle, and the billing dove;
And all the feather'd kind, who could fuppofe

. (But that from fight, the fureft fenfe, he knows)
They from th' included yolk, not ambient white arofe.
There are who think the marrow of a man,
Which in the spine, while he was living, ran;
When dead, the pith corrupted, will become
A fnake, and hiss within the hollow tomb.

All these receive their birth from other things;
But from himself the phoenix only springs :
Self-born, begotten by the parent flame
In which he burn'd, another and the same :
Who not by corn or herbs his life fuftains,
But the sweet effence of Amomum drains:
And watches the rich gums Arabia bears,
While yet in tender dew they drop their tears.
He, (his five centuries of life fulfill’d)
His neft on oaken boughs begins to build,
Or trembling tops of palm: and first he draws
The plan with his broad bill, and crooked claws,
Nature's artificers; on this the pile

Is form'd, and rifes round; then with the spoil
Of Cafia, Cynamon, and ftems of Nard,

(For foftness ftrew'd beneath,) his fun'ral bed is rear'd: Fun'ral and bridal both; and all around

The borders with corruptlefs myrrh are crown'd:

On this incumbent; till ætherial flame
Firft catches, then confumes the coftly frame;
Confumes him too, as on the pile he lies;
He liv'd on odours, and in odours dies.

An infant-phoenix from the former fprings,
His father's heir, and from his tender wings
Shakes off his parent duft, his method he purfues,
And the fame leafe of life on the fame terms renews:
When grown to manhood he begins his reign,
And with stiff pinions can his flight fuftain,
He lightens of its load the tree that bore
His father's royal fepulchre before,
And his own cradle: this with pious care
Plac'd on his back, he cuts the buxom air,
Seeks the fun's city, and his facred church,
And decently lays down his burden in the porch.
A wonder more amazing would we find ?
Th' Hyæna fhews it, of a double kind,
Varying the fexes in alternate years,
In one begets, and in another bears.
The thin cameleon, fed with air, receives
The colour of the thing to which he cleaves.
India, when conquer'd, on the conqu❜ring God
For planted vines the fharp-ey'd lynx beftow'd,
Whofe urine, fhed before it touches earth,
Congeals in air, and gives to gems their birth.
So coral, foft and white in ocean's bed,
Comes harden'd up in air, and glows with red.

All changing fpecies fhould my fong recite;
Before I ceas'd, wou'd change the day to night.
Nations and empires flourish and decay,
By turns command, and in their turns obey;
Time foftens hardy people, time again
Hardens to war a foft, unwarlike train.
Thus Troy, for ten long years, her foes with ftood,
And daily bleeding bore th' expence of blood:

Now

Now for thick ftreets it fhews an empty space,
Or only fill'd with tombs of her own perish'd race,
Herfelf becomes the fepulchre of what he was.

Mycene, Sparta, Thebes of mighty fame,
Are vanish'd out of fubftance into name,
And Dardan Rome, that just begins to rise,
On Tiber's banks, in time fhall mate the skies;
Widening her bounds, and working on her way;
Ev'n now the meditates imperial fway:

Yet this is change, but fhe by changing thrives,
Like moons new born, and in her cradle ftrives
To fill her infant-horns; an hour fhall come
When the round world shall be contain’d in Rome.
For thus old faws foretel, and Helenus

Anchifes' drooping fon enliven'd thus,
When Ilium now was in a finking state,
And he was doubtful of his future fate:

O Goddess born, with thy hard fortune strive,
Troy never can be left, and thou alive.

Thy paffage thou fhalt free thro' fire and fword,
And Troy in foreign lands fhall be restor❜d.
In happier fields a rifing town I fee,

Greater than what e'er was, or is, or e'er fhall be:
And heav'n yet owes the world a race deriv'd from thee.
Sages and chiefs, of other lineage born,,
The city fhall extend, extended fhall adorn:
But from Jülus he muft draw his birth,

By whom thy Rome fhall rule the conquer'd earth:
Whom heav'n will lend mankind on earth to reign,
And late require the precious pledge again.
This Helenus to great Æneas told,

Which I retain, e'er fince in other mold
My foul was cloth'd; and now rejoice to view
My country walls rebuilt, and Troy reviv'd anew,
Rais'd by the fall: decreed by lofs to gain;

}

Enflav'd but to be free, and conquer'd but to reign.

"Tis time my hard-mouth'd courfers to controul,
Apt to run riot, and tranfgrefs the goal:
And therefore I conclude, whatever lies
In earth, or flits in air, or fills the skies,
All fuffer change, and we, that are of foul
And body mix'd, are members of the whole.
Then when our fires, or grandfires fhall forfake
The forms of men, and brutal figures take,
Thus hous'd, fecurely let their spirits reft,
Nor violate thy father in the beast,

Thy friend, thy brother, any of thy kin;
If none of thefe, yet there's a man within:
O fpare to make a Thyeftean meal,
T'inclose his body, and his foul expel.
Ill cuftoms by degrees to habits rife,
Ill habits foon become exalted vice:
What more advance can mortals make in fin
So near perfection, who with blood begin?
Deaf to the calf that lies beneath the knife,
Looks up, and from her butcher begs her life:
Deaf to the harmlefs kid, that ere he dies,
All methods to procure thy mercy tries,
And imitates in vain thy childrens cries.
Where will he ftop, who feeds with houfhold bread,
Then eats the poultry which before he fed ?

Let plough thy fteers; that when they lofe their breath,
To Nature, not to thee, they may impute their death.
Let goats for food their loaded udders lend,

And fheep from winter-cold thy fides defend ;
But neither fprindges, nets, nor fnares employ,
And be no more ingenious to destroy.
Free as in air, let birds on earth remain,
Nor let infidious glue their wings conftrain;
Nor opening hounds the trembling ftag affright,
Nor purple feathers intercept his flight:
Nor hooks conceal'd in baits for fish prepare,
Nor lines to heave 'em twinkling up in air.