No More Learning

While wavering counsels thus his mind engage,
Fluctuates in doubtful thought the Pylian sage,
To join the host, or to the general haste;
Debating long, he fixes on the last:
Yet, as he moves, the sight his bosom warms,
The field rings dreadful with the clang of arms,
The gleaming falchions flash, the javelins fly;
Blows echo blows, and all or kill or die.

Him, in his march, the wounded princes meet,
By tardy steps ascending from the fleet:
The king of men, Ulysses the divine,
And who to Tydeus owes his noble line. (232)
(Their ships at distance from the battle stand,
In lines advanced along the shelving strand:
Whose bay, the fleet unable to contain
At length; beside the margin of the main,
Rank above rank, the crowded ships they moor:
Who landed first, lay highest on the shore. )
Supported on the spears, they took their way,
Unfit to fight, but anxious for the day.
Nestor's approach alarm'd each Grecian breast,
Whom thus the general of the host address'd:

"O grace and glory of the Achaian name;
What drives thee, Nestor, from the field of fame?
Shall then proud Hector see his boast fulfill'd,
Our fleets in ashes, and our heroes kill'd?
Such was his threat, ah! now too soon made good,
On many a Grecian bosom writ in blood.
Is every heart inflamed with equal rage
Against your king, nor will one chief engage?
And have I lived to see with mournful eyes
In every Greek a new Achilles rise? "

Gerenian Nestor then: "So fate has will'd;
And all-confirming time has fate fulfill'd.
Not he that thunders from the aerial bower,
Not Jove himself, upon the past has power.
The wall, our late inviolable bound,
And best defence, lies smoking on the ground:
Even to the ships their conquering arms extend,
And groans of slaughter'd Greeks to heaven ascend.
On speedy measures then employ your thought
In such distress! if counsel profit aught:
Arms cannot much: though Mars our souls incite,
These gaping wounds withhold us from the fight.
"

To him the monarch: "That our army bends,
That Troy triumphant our high fleet ascends,
And that the rampart, late our surest trust
And best defence, lies smoking in the dust;
All this from Jove's afflictive hand we bear,
Who, far from Argos, wills our ruin here.
Past are the days when happier Greece was blest,
And all his favour, all his aid confess'd;
Now heaven averse, our hands from battle ties,
And lifts the Trojan glory to the skies.
Cease we at length to waste our blood in vain,
And launch what ships lie nearest to the main;
Leave these at anchor, till the coming night:
Then, if impetuous Troy forbear the fight,
Bring all to sea, and hoist each sail for flight.
Better from evils, well foreseen, to run,
Than perish in the danger we may shun. "

Thus he. The sage Ulysses thus replies,
While anger flash'd from his disdainful eyes:
"What shameful words (unkingly as thou art)
Fall from that trembling tongue and timorous heart?
Oh were thy sway the curse of meaner powers,
And thou the shame of any host but ours!
A host, by Jove endued with martial might,
And taught to conquer, or to fall in fight:
Adventurous combats and bold wars to wage,
Employ'd our youth, and yet employs our age.
And wilt thou thus desert the Trojan plain?
And have whole streams of blood been spilt in vain?
In such base sentence if thou couch thy fear,
Speak it in whispers, lest a Greek should hear.
Lives there a man so dead to fame, who dares
To think such meanness, or the thought declares?
And comes it even from him whose sovereign sway
The banded legions of all Greece obey?
Is this a general's voice that calls to flight,
While war hangs doubtful, while his soldiers fight?
What more could Troy? What yet their fate denies
Thou givest the foe: all Greece becomes their prize.