Τὸ μέλλον ἥξει. Καὶ σὺ μὲ ἐν τάχει παρὼν Αγαν γ' ἀληθόμαντιν οἰκτείρας ἐρεῖς. Eschyl. Agam. 1225. ARGUMENT. THE Ode commences with an address to the Divine Providence, that regulates into one vast harmony all the events of time, however calamitous some of them may appear to mortals. The second Strophe calls on men to suspend their private joys and sorrows, and devote them for a while to the cause of human nature in general. The first Epode speaks of the Empress of Russia, who died of an apoplexy on the 17th of November, 1796; having just concluded a subsidiary treaty with the Kings combined against France. The first and second Antistrophe describe the image of the Departing Year, &c., as in a vision. The second Epode prophecies, in anguish of spirit, the downfall of this country. I. SPIRIT who sweepest the wild harp of Time! I saw the train of the departing Year! This Ode was composed on the 24th, 25th, and 26th days of December, 1796; and was first published on the last day of that year. Starting from my silent sadness Then with no unholy madness Ere yet the entered cloud foreclosed my sight, I raised the impetuous song, and solemnised his flight II. Hither from the recent tomb, From the prisoner's direr gloom, And thence, where poverty doth waste and languish! Love illumines manhood's maze; Or where o'er cradled infants bending Ye Woes! ye young-eyed Joys! advance! By Time's wild harp, and by the hand Raises its fateful strings from sleep, And each domestic hearth, Haste for one solemn hour; And with a loud and yet a louder voice, Still echoes the dread name that o'er the earth And now advance in saintly jubilee Justice and Truth! They too have heard thy spell! They too obey thy name, divinest Liberty! III. I marked Ambition in his war-array! I heard the mailed Monarch's troublous cry"Ah! wherefore does the Northern Conqueress stay! Groans not her chariot on its onward way? Fly, mailed Monarch, fly! Stunned by Death's twice mortal mace, The insatiate hag shall gloat with drunken eye! Ye that gasped on Warsaw's plain! 'Mid women's shrieks and infants' screams! Sudden blasts of triumph swelling, Oft, at night, in misty train, Rush around her narrow dwelling! The exterminating fiend is fled (Foul her life, and dark her doom) Mighty armies of the dead Dance, like death-fires, round her tomb! Then with prophetic song relate, Each some tyrant-murderer's fate! IV. Departing Year! 'twas on no earthly shore With many an unimaginable groan Thou storied'st thy sad hours! Silence ensued, Then, his eye wild ardours glancing, The Spirit of the Earth made reverence meet, V. Throughout the blissful throng, Till wheeling round the throne the Lampads seven, (The mystic Words of Heaven) Permissive signal make: The fervent Spirit bowed, then spread his wings and spake! "Thou in stormy blackness throning By the Earth's unsolaced groaning, And hunger's bosom to the frost-winds bared! Strange, horrible, and foul! By what deep guilt belongs To the deaf Synod, 'full of gifts and lies!' For ever shall the thankless Island scowl, Her quiver full, and with unbroken bow? Speak! from thy storm-black Heaven O speak aloud And on the darkling foe Open thine eye of fire from some uncertain cloud! O dart the flash! O rise and deal the blow! The Past to thee, to thee the Future cries! Hark! how wide Nature joins her Rise, God of Nature! rise." VI. groans below! The voice had ceased, the vision fled; Cold sweat-drops gather on my limbs ; The soldier on the war-field spread, (The strife is o'er, the day-light fled, And the night-wind clamours hoarse! See the starting wretch's head Lies pillowed on a brother's corse!) VII. Not yet enslaved, not wholly vile, |