For not the vengeful power, that glow'd with rage,
With such amazing virtue darst engage.
The clouds dispers’d, Apollo's wrath expir’d,
And from the wondering god the unwilling youth,

retird.
Thence we these altars in his temple raise,
And offer annual honours, feasts, and praise ;
These solemn feasts propitious Phæbus please ;
These honours, still renew'd, his ancient wrath apo

peases • But say, illustrious guest! (adjoin'd the king) What name you bear, from what high race yout

spring?
The noble Tydeus stands confess'd, and known
Our neighbour prince, and heir of Calydon:
Relate your fortunes, while the friendly night
And silent hours to various talk iovite.'

The Theban bends on earth his gloomy eyes,
Confus'd and sadly thus at length replies :-

• Before these altars how shall I proclaim (O generous prince !) my nation or my name, Or through what veins our ancient blood has rollid? Let the sad, tale for ever rest untold! Yet if, propitious to a wretch unknown, You seek to share in sorrows not your own, Kpow then from Cadmus I derive my race, Jocasta's son, and Thebes my native place.' To whom the king (who felt his generous breast Touch'd with concern for his unliappy guest) Replies Ah! why forbears the son to name His wretched father, known too well by fame? Fame, that delights around the world to stray, Scorns not to take our Argos in her way. Ev'n those who dwell where sups at distance roll, Io northern wilds, and freeze beneath the pole,

}

And those who tread the burning Libyan lands,
The faithless syrtes, and the moving sands;
Who view the western sea's extremest bounds,
Or drink of Ganges in their eastern grounds;
All these the woes of Elipus have known,
Your fates, your furies, and your haunted town.
If on the sons the parents' crimes descend,
What prince from those his lineage can defend?
Be this tby comfort, that 'tis thine to' efface,
With virtuous acts, thy ancestors' disgrace,
Aud he thyself the honour of thy race.
But see! the stars begin to steal away,
And shine more faintly at approaching day;
Now pour the wine ; and in your tunefal lays
Once inore resound the great Apollo's praise.'

O father Phæbus ! whether Lycia's coast
And snowy mountains thy bright presence boast :
Whether to sweet Castalia thou repair,
And bathe in silver dews thy yellow hair;
Or pleas’d to find fair Delos float no more,
Delight in Cynthus and the shady shore;
Or choose thy seat in Ilion's proud abodes,
The shining structures rais'd by labouring gods;
By thee the bow and mortal shafts are borne ;
Eternal charms thy blooming youth adorn:
Skill'd in the laws of secret fåte above,
And the dark counsels of almighty Jove,
"Tis thine the seeds of future war to know,
The change of sceptres and impending woe,
When direful meteors spread through glowing air
Long trails of light, and shake their blazing hair
Thy rage the Phrygian felt, who durst aspire
To excel the music of thy heavenly lyre;
Thy shafts aveng'd lew'd Tityus' guilty Hame
The' immortal victim of thy mother's fame

VOL. I.

146 PROLOGUE TO MR. ADDISON'S CATO.
Thy hand slew Python, and the dame who lost
Her numerous offspring for a fatal boast.
In Phlegyas' doom thy just revenge appears,
Condemn'd to furies and eternal fears;
He views his food, but dreads, with lifted eye,
The mouldering rock that trembles from on bigh.

• Propitious hear our pray'r, O power divine!
And on thy hospitable Argos shine ;
Whether the style of Titan please thee more,
Whose purple rays the' Achæmenes adore ;
Or great Osiris, who first taught the swain
In Pharian fields to sow the golden grain;
Or Mithra, to whose beams, the Persian bows
And pays, in hollow rocks, his awful vows;
Mithra! whose liead the blaze of light adorns,
Who grasps the struggling heifer's lunar horns."

PROLOGUE

TO
MR. ADDISON'S CATO.

To wake the soul by tender strokes of art,
To raise the genius, and to mend the beart;
To make mankind, in conscious virtue bold,
Live o'er each scene, and be what they behold:
For this the tragic Muse tirst trod the stage,
Commanding tears to stream through every age;
Tyrants no more their savage nature kept,
And foes to virtue wonder'd how they wept.
Our author shuns by vulgar springs to move
The hero's glory, or the virgin's love;
In pitying love, we but our weakness show,
And wild ambition well deserves its woe.

PROLOGUE TO MR. ADDISON'S CATO. 147 Here tears shall flow from a more generous cause, Such tears as patriots shed for dying laws : He bids your breasts with ancient ardour rise, And calls forth Roman drops from British eyes. Virtue confess'd in human shape he draws, What Plato thought, and godlike Cato was : No common object to your sight displays, But what with pleasure Heaven itself surveys, A brave man struggling in the storms of fate, And greatly falling with a falling state. While Cato gives his little senate laws, What bosom beats not in his country's cause? Who sees him act, but envies every deed ? Who hears kim groan, and does not wish to bleed? Ev'n when proud Cæsar, midst triumpbal cars, The spoils of nations, and the pomp of wars, Ignobly vain, and impotently great, Show'd Rome her Cato's figure drawn in state; As her dead father's reverend image past, The pomp was darken'd, and the day o'ercast; The triumph ceas'd, tears gush'd from every eye; The world's great victor pass'd uplieeded by; Her last good man dejected Rome ador'd, And honour'd Cæsar's less than Cato's sword.

Britons! attend: be worth like this approv'd, And show you have the virtue to be mov'd. With honest scorn the first fam'd Cato view'd Rome learning arts from Greece,whom she subdued: Your scene precariously subsists too long On French translation and Italian song. Dare to have sense yourselves; assert the stage, Be justly warm'd with your own native rage : Such plays alone should win a British ear, As Cato's self had not disdain'd to hear.

148

EPILOGUE

TO

MR. ROWE'S JANE SHORE.

( Designed for Mrs. Oldfield.) PRODIGIOUS this! the frail one of our play From ber own sex should mercy find to-day! You might have beld the pretty bead aside, Peep'd in your fans, been serious, thus, and cried, · The play may pass—but that strange ereature,

Shore, I can't-indeed now-I so hate a whoreJust as a blockhead rnbs his thoughtless skull, And thanks his stars he was not born a fool; So from a sister sinner you shall hear, • How strangely you expose yourself, my dear ! But let me die, all raillery apart, Our sex are still forgiving at their heart; And, did not wicked custom so contrive, We'd be the best good-natur'd things alive.

There are, 'tis true, who tell another tale, That virtuous ladies envy while they rail ; Sach rage without betrays the fire within ; In some close corner of the soal they sin; Still hoarding up, most scandalously nice, Amidst their virtues a reserve of vice. The godly dame, who fleshly failings damps, Scolds with her maid, or with her chaplain crams. Would you enjoy soft vights, and solid dippers ? Faith, gallants! board with saints, and bed with sin

Well, if our author in his wife ottends, [ners. He has a husband that will make amends :