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LIBERTY.

PART

III.

H

ERE melting mix'd with air th' ideal forms, That painted still whate'er the GODDESS sung. Then I, impatient. From extinguish'd GREECE, "To what new region stream'd the Human Day?" She softly fighing, as when Zephyr leaves, Resign'd to Boreas, the declining year, Refum'd. Indignant, these & last scenes I fled; And long ere then, Leucadia's cloudy cliff, And the Ceraunian hills behind me thrown, All LATIUM stood arous'd. Ages before, Great mother of republics! GREECE had pour'd,

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Swarm after swarm, her ardent youth around.
On Afia, Afric, Sicily, they stoop'd,
But shief on fair HESPERIA'S Winding shore;

Where, from § Lacinium to Etrurian vales,

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+ The last struggles of Liberty in GREECE.

§ A promontory in Calabria.

They roll'd increasing colonies along,

And lent materials for my ROMAN REIGN.

With them my Spirit spread; and num'rous states,

And cities rofe, on Grecian models form'd;

As its parental policy, and arts,

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Each had imbib'd. Besides, to each affign'd
A Guardian Genius, o'er the public weal,
Kept an unclofing eye; try'd to sustain, -
Or more fublime, the foul infus'd by ME :
And strong the battle rose, with various wave,
Against the Tyrant Demons of the land.
Thus they their little wars and triumphs knew;
Their flows of fortune, and receding times,

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But almost all below the proud regard
Of story vow'd to ROME, on deeds intent
That Truth beyond the flight of Fable bore.

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Not so the † SAMIAN SAGE; to him belongs

The brightest witness of recording Fame.
For these free states his native ‡ ifle forfook,

And a vain tyrant's tranfitory finile,

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He fought Crotona's pure falubrious air,

And thro' f Great Greece his gentle wisdom taught; Wifdom that calm'd for * lift'ning years the mind, Nor ever heard amid the storm of zeal.

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His mental eye first launch'd into the deeps

+ PYTHAGORAS.

† Samos, over which then reigned the tyrant POLICRATES.

§ The fouthern parts of Italy and Sicily, fo called because of the

Grecian colonies there settled.

• His scholars were enjoin'd filence for five years.

Of boundless ether: where unnumber'd orbs,
Myriads on myriads, thro' the pathless sky

Unerring roll, and wind their steady way.
There he the full consenting choir beheld;
There first discern'd the secret band of love
The kind attraction, that to central funs
Binds circling earths, and world with world unites.

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Instructed thence, he great ideas form'd
Of the whole-moving, all-informing Gon,
The Sun of beings! beaming unconfin'd

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Light, life, and love, and ever-active pow'r :
Whom nought can image, and who best approves

The filent worship of the moral heart,

That joys in bounteous heav'n, and spreads the joy..

Nor scorn'd the foaring fage to stoop to life,

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And bound his reason to the sphere of Man.
He gave the four yet of reigning virtues name;.
Inspir'd the study of the finer arts,
That civilize mankind, and laws -devis'd
Where with enlighten'd justice mercy mix'd.
He even, into his tender system, took
Whatever shares the brotherhood of life:
He taught that life's indissoluble-flame,.
From brute to man, and man to brute again,
For ever shifting, runs th' eternal round;

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Thence try'd against the blood-polluted meal,
And limbs yet quiv'ring with some kindred foul,.
To turn the human heart. Delightful truth!

The four cardinal virtues.

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Had he beheld the living chain afcend,
And not a circling Form but rifing Whole.
Amid these small republics one arofe,
On yellow Tyber's bank almighty ROME,
Fated for ME. A nobler spirit warm'd
Her fons; and, rous'd by tyrants, nobler still
It burn'd in BRUTUS; the proud Tarquins chas'd, 75
With all their crimes; bade radiant æras rise,
And the long honours of the Conful-Line.

Here from the fairer, not the greater, plan Of GREECE I vary'd; whose unmixing states, By the keen foul of emulation pierc'd,

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Long wage'd alone the bloodless war of arts,

And their best empire gain'd. But to diffuse
O'er Men an empire was my purpose now :

To let thy martial Majefty abroad;

Into the vortex of one state to draw

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The whole mix'd Force, and Liberty, on earth;
To conquer Tyrants, and set Nations free.

Already have I given, with flying touch, A broken view of this my amplest reign. Now, while its first, last, periods you furvey, Mark how it lab'ring rose, and rapid fell.

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When ROME in noon-tide empire grasp'd the world,

And, foon as her resistless legions shone,
The nations stoop'd around; tho' then appear'd
Her grandeur most, yet in her dawn of pow'r,
By many a jealous equal people press'd,
Then was the toil, the mighty struggle then;

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Then for each Roman I an hero told;

And ev'ry passing fun, and Latian scene,

Saw patriot virtues then, and awful deeds,
That or furpass the faith of modern times,
Or, if believ'd, with facred horror strike.
For then, to prove my most exalted pow'r,
I to the point of full perfection push'd,
To fondness and enthusiastic zeal,
The great, the reigning passion of the Free.
That godlike paffion! which, the bounds of Self
Divinely bursting, the whole public takes
Into the heart, enlarg'd, and burning high
With the mix'd ardor of unnumber'd Selves;

Of all who fafe beneath the Voted Laws

Of the fame parent state, fraternal, live.
From this kind Sun of Moral Nature flow'd
Virtues, that shine the light of human-kind,
And, ray'd thro' story, warm remotest time.
These Virtues too, reflected to their fource,
Increas'd its flame. The social charm went round,
The fair idea, more attractive still,

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As more by Virtue mark'd; till Romans, all

One band of friends, unconquerable grew.

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Hence, when their Country rais'd her plaintive.

voice,

The voice of pleading Nature was not heard;
And in their hearts the fathers throbb'd no more:

Stern to themselves, but gentle to the whole.
Hence sweeten'd Pain, the luxury of toil;
Patience, that baffled fortune's utmost rage;
High-minded Hope, which at the lowest ebb,
When Brennus conquer'd, and when Canna bled,
The bravest impulse felt, and scorn'd defpair.

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