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Priest of the Nine! who to their bard had giv'n
To scale the steep, and pierce the vault of heav'n,
And led th' impassion'd votary of their love
Through all the mazes of the sacred grove.
Some power the Poet found, some mystic God, †
Throned on each rock, or frowning from each wood,
And saw, emerging through the gloom, the form ‡
Of Jove's dread Ægis darkening all the storm.
Soon issuing from the woods, he taught the swain ||
To clothe the cultured fields with golden grain,
Beneath what sign to turn the glebe, and join
To friendly elm the marriageable vine;

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Credunt se vidisse Jovem, cùm sæpè nigrantem
Ægida concuteret dextrâ, nimbosque cieret.

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Quid faciat lætas segetes, quo sidere terram
Vertere, Mæcenas, ulmisque adjungerè vites
Conveniat ; quæ cura boum, qui cultus habendo
Sit pecori, apibus quanta experientia parcis,
Hinc canere incipiam.

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What's due to flocks and herds; and how to rear
The straw-built hive, the bee's continual care;
Dear to the hinds! then met, in loftier strain, *
Bold Homer's genius on th' embattled plain;
Like Cuma's virgin, at HIS presence glow'd; †
Touch'd, rapt, dilated by th' inspiring God,
Ethereal ardors through each fibre dart,
Flame in his breast, and swell his labouring heart;
With sacred frenzy fraught, his bosom shook,
Sounds more than mortal from that bosom broke,
And more than mortal seem'd the Poet's look!

* Gratum opus Agricolis! At nunc horrentia Martis
Arma!-

+ We may, without any great stretch of imagination, conceive Virgil, when taking Homer as his guide and model, to have found himself in the predicament of the daughter of Glaucus-"Deus-ecce Deus!

Cui talia fanti

Ante fores subitò, non vultus, non color unus,
Non comptæ mansere comæ ; sed pectus anhelum,
Et rabie fera corda tument; majorque videri,

Nec mortale sonans!

Bacchatur vates magnum si pectore possit
Excussisse Deum: tantò magis ille fatigat

Os rabidum, fera corda domans, fingitque premendo.

When, throned
supreme, the Great Augustus saw
The subject earth confess the Roman law ;
Whilst a whole world, and all its vast affairs,
Its arts and arms, engaged his anxious cares;
He, wise as great, could for the Muses steal
An hour, and not defraud the public weal;
To Maro's strains and Flaccus' verse attend,
And claim, and boast, each poet as his friend. †

He loved the Bards, and full return they made,
And well the favour they received repaid;
They bade the vessel of the state no more‡
Attempt the billows, or forsake the shore

;

*

* Cùm tot sustineas et tanta negotia solus,
Res italas armis tuteris, moribus ornes,
Legibus emendes, in publica commoda peccem,
Si longo sermone morer tua tempora, Cæsar.

† An vereris ne apud posteros infame tibi sit, quod videaris familiaris nobis esse. Such is the language of this great and accomplished prince, when reproaching one of his favourite poets for want of familiarity with

him.

O navis, referent in mare te novi
Fluctus? O quid agis? fortiter occupa
Portum. Nonne vides ut

Nudum remigio latus,

Et malus celeri saucius africo,

Antennæque gemant; ac sine funibus

No more its shatter'd sides and sails expose

To the dire tempest of domestic woes ; And pray'd those powers, that grace th' Olympian dome, *

Immortal guardians of Imperial Rome,

Whom valour raised into the blest abodes,
And virtue crown'd, enthroned amongst the Gods,
To view mankind in wild disorder hurl'd,
And aid young Cæsar to redeem the world.

And see yon temple lift its marble pride, †
Where the broad Mincius rolls its limpid tide,

Vix durare Carinæ

Possint imperiosius
Aequor?

* Dii patrii indigetes, et Romule, Vestaque Mater,
Quæ Thuscum Tiberim, et Romana palatia servas,

Hunc saltem everso Juvenem succurrere seclo

Ne prohibete...

Virgile n'est plus un simple ecrivain, qui decrit les travaux rustiques. C'est un nouvel Orphée, qui ne manie sa lyre, que pour faire deposer aux sauvages leur ferocité, et pour les réunir par les liens des mœurs et des loix.

+ Et viridi in campo Templum de marmore ponam,
Propter aquam, tardis ingens ubi flexibus errat
Mincius, et tenera prætexit arundine ripas.

In medio mihi CESAR erit, templumque tenebit!

Rear'd by the Nine! There CAESAR'S statue stands
Full in the centre, and the fane commands!
Whilst grateful genius weaves the wreathes, that shed

Eternal honours 'round her Patron's head,

And graves beneath, and, as she

graves,

she sighs,

NONE SUCH E'ER ROSE BEFORE- -OR EVER MORE SHALL

RISE! *

What, though he made, with arbitrary sway, †
The Roman world, and Rome herself obey,

-Taken in the

* NIL ORITURUM ALIAS, NIL ORTUM TALE! sense, to which the Rhapsodist applies it, there is nothing excessive, and, therefore, nothing disgusting, in the flattery convey'd in this passage; nor, we very much fear, any thing very extravagant in it, considered as a prediction. Octavius has many rivals in the modern world, many, even, who have completely outstripped him, in the career of atrocity; but, as a liberal encourager of learning, AUGUSTUS has none. His policy, not less than his taste, was evinced by such conduct. He left, to the very worst and the most brutal of his successors, the part of extinguishing literary freedom, by the persecution of authors, and the burning of their works, "scilicet, illo igne vocem Populi Romani, et libertatem Senatûs, et conscientiam Generis humani aboleri arbitrabantur.”

+ Qui etsi orbem Romanum, ipsamque Romam flecti sub principatu coegit, edocuitque procacem plebem cognata nomina Dominum atque Amicum commiscere animo, præcipitari tamen liberum spiritum permisit, nec ad obtundendam aciem ingenii, impetumve mentis coercendum unquam duravit.

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