AGRIP. My thought aches at him; not the basilisk More deadly to the sight, than is to me ACER. 160 Why then stays my sovereign, Where he so soon may AGRIP. Yes, I will be gone, 165 But not to Antium - all shall be confess'd, Whate'er the frivolous tongue of giddy fame Has spread among the crowd; things, that but whisper'd Have arch'd the hearer's brow, and riveted His eyes in fearful extasy: no matter 170 What; so't be strange and dreadful. - Sorceries, And you, ye manes of ambition's victims, V. 169. "Whom have I hurt? has poet yet or peer "To arch the brows which on them gaz'd." 175 V. Marvell. Poems, i. 45. V. 172. Pour rendre sa puissance, et la vôtre odieuses, J'avoûrai les rumeurs les plus injurieuses, Je confesserai tout, exils, assassinâts, Poison même." Britannicus, act iii. sc. 3. See also Taciti Annales, lib. xiii. c. 15. V. 176. "Prô facinus ingens! fœminæ est munus datus If from the realms of night my voice ye hear, Accept my vengeance. Though by me ye bled, SCENE II. OTHO, POPP EA. 185 [Exeunt. Отно. Thus far we're safe. Thanks to the rosy queen Of amorous thefts: and had her wanton son 195 Seneca Octavia, ver. 148. V. 195. "Obstipum caput et tereti cervice reflexum." Cic. de Nat. Deor. ii. 42. "Et caput inflexâ lentum cervice recumbit Marmoreâ." "Nivea cervice reclinis Mollitur ipsa." Virgilii Ciris. 449. Manil. Astron. 5. v. 555. This particular beauty is also given to Helen by Constantine By the young Trojan to his gilded bark 196 HYMN TO IGNORANCE. A FRAGMENT. [See Mason's Memoirs, vol. iii. p. 75. Supposed to be written about the year 1742, when Gray returned to Cambridge.] HAIL, horrors, hail! ye ever gloomy bowers, Manasses, in his "Annales," (see Meursii Opera, vol. vii. p. 390): Δειρὴ μακρὰ καταλευκος, ὅθεν ἐμυθουργήθη Κυκνογενῆ τὴν εὐόπτον Ἑλένην χρημάτιζειν. And so also in the Antehomerica of Tzetzes, ed. Jacobs. p. 115 (though the passage is corrupted). "That soft cheek springing to the marble neck, Akenside. Pl. of Imag. b. i. p. 112. ed. Park. V. 197. See Milton. Par. L. iv. 310: "Yielded with coy submission, modest pride, And sweet, reluctant amorous delay." V. 1. "Hail, horrors, hail!" Milton. Par. L. i. 205. Luke. V. 3. "Jam nec arundiferum mihi cura revisere Camum," Miltoni Eleg. i. 11. and 89. "juncosas Cami remeare paludes." Luke. Glad I revisit thy neglected reign, Oh take me to thy peaceful shade again. 5 [high 10 But chiefly thee, whose influence breathed from - 15 20 Oh say she hears me not, but, careless grown, Lethargic nods upon her ebon throne. V. 4. "Where rivers now Stream, and perpetual draw their humid train." Milton. Par. Lost, vii. 310. V. 14. "To hatch a new Saturnian age of lead." Pope. Dunciad, i. 28. And so in the speech of Ignorance in "Henry and Minerva," by I. B. 1729 (one among the poetical pieces bound up by Pope in his library, and now in my possession): "Myself behind this ample shield of lead, Will to the field my daring squadrons head." V. 17. "Let Fancy still my sense in Lethe steep." Shakesp. T. Night. act iv. sc. 1. Luke. V. 22. "Here Ignorance in steel was arm'd, and there Cloath'd in a cowl, dissembled fast and pray'r; 25 Goddess!, awake, arise! alas, my fears! For ever gone High on her car, behold the grandam ride *** a team of harness'd monarchs bend 30 35 Against my sway her pious hand stretch'd out, And so in the Dunciad, b. i. ver. 80: "All these, and more, the cloud-compelling queen V. 25. Milt. P. L. i. 330. Luke. V. 37. "Sesostris-like, such charioteers as these High on his car, Sesostris struck my view, Pope. T. of Fame. Luke. And so S. Philips. Blenheim, v. 16: "As curst Sesostris, proud Egyptian king, That monarchs harness'd to his chariot yok'd." |