ODE TO PITY. O THOU, the friend of man assign'd, And charm his frantic woe: с By Pella's bard, a magic name, By all the griefs his thought could frame, Receive my humble rite: Long, Pity, let the nations view 5 10 Thy sky-worn robes of tenderest blue, And eyes of dewy light! But wherefore need I wander wide To old Ilissus' distant side, Deserted stream, and mute? Wild Arund too has heard thy strains, And Echo, midst my native plains, с Been sooth'd by Pity's lute. 15 Euripides, of whom Aristotle pronounces, on a comparison of him with Sophocles, that he was the greater master of the tender passions, ἦν τραγικώτερος. [Καὶ ὁ Εὐριπίδης, εἰ καὶ τὰ ἄλλα μὴ εὖ οἰκονομεῖ, ἀλλα τραγικώτατός γε τῶν ποιητῶν paivera. Aristot. de Poet. p. 44. ed. Tyrwhitt, 1794. D.] d The river Arun runs by the village in Sussex where Otway had his birth. 20 There first the wren thy myrtles shed To him thy cell was shown; And while he sung the female heart, Come, Pity, come, by Fancy's aid, Shall raise a wild enthusiast heat In all who view the shrine. There Picture's toils shall well relate, O'er mortal bliss prevail : The buskin'd Muse shall near her stand, ODE TO FEAR. THOU, to whom the world unknown, I see, I see thee near. I know thy hurried step, thy haggard eye! Who stalks his round, an hideous form, 5 10 15 And those, the fiends, who, near allied, Whilst Vengeance, in the lurid air, 20 Lifts her red arm, expos'd and bare: e On whom that ravening brood of Fate, Who lap the blood of sorrow, wait: Who, Fear, this ghastly train can see, And look not madly wild, like thee! 25 Alluding to the Kuvas apuкrove of Sophocles. See the Electra. EPODE. In earliest Greece, to thee, with partial choice, The grief-full Muse addrest her infant tongue ; The maids and matrons, on her awful voice, Silent and pale, in wild amazement hung. Yet he, the bard who first invok'd thy name, 30 For not alone he nurs'd the poet's flame, But who is he whom later garlands grace, Who left a while o'er Hybla's dews to rove, With trembling eyes thy dreary steps to trace, Where thou and furies shar'd the baleful grove? g 35 Wrapt in thy cloudy veil, th' incestuous & queen Sigh'd the sad call her son and husband hear'd, When once alone it broke the silent scene, 40 And he the wretch of Thebes no more appear'd. O Fear, I know thee by my throbbing heart: Yet all the thunders of the scene are thine! 45 f Eschylus. g Jocasta. h · οὐδ ̓ ἔτ ̓ ὠρώρει βοή, Ην μὲν σιωπή· φθέγμα δ ̓ ἐξαίφνης τινὸς Θώϋξεν αὐτόν, ὥστε πάντας ὀρθίας See the Edip. Colon. of Sophocles. ANTISTROPHE. Thou who such weary lengths hast past, Where gloomy Rape and Murder dwell? 'Gainst which the big waves beat, 50 Hear drowning seamen's cries, in tempests brought? Which thy awakening bards have told : O thou whose spirit most possest The sacred seat of Shakspeare's breast! By all that from thy prophet broke, In thy divine emotions spoke; Hither again thy fury deal, 55 60 65 Teach me but once like him to feel: 70 And I, O Fear, will dwell with thee! |