No More Learning

While thus the peerage in the games contends,
In act to speak, Laodamas ascends.

"O friends (he cries), the stranger seems well skill'd
To try the illustrious labours of the field:
I deem him brave: then grant the brave man's claim,
Invite the hero to his share of fame.
What nervous arms he boasts! how firm his tread!
His limbs how turn'd! how broad his shoulders spread!
By age unbroke! --but all-consuming care
Destroys perhaps the strength that time would spare:
Dire is the ocean, dread in all its forms!
Man must decay when man contends with storms. "

"Well hast thou spoke (Euryalus replies):
Thine is the guest, invite him thou to rise. "
Swift as the word, advancing from the crowd,
He made obeisance, and thus spoke aloud:

"Vouchsafes the reverend stranger to display
His manly worth, and share the glorious day?
Father, arise! for thee thy port proclaims
Expert to conquer in the solemn games.
To fame arise! for what more fame can yield
Than the swift race, or conflict of the field?
Steal from corroding care one transient day,
To glory give the space thou hast to stay;
Short is the time, and lo! e'en now the gales
Call thee aboard, and stretch the swelling sails. "

To whom with sighs Ulysses gave reply:
"Ah why the ill-suiting pastime must I try?
To gloomy care my thoughts alone are free;
Ill the gay sorts with troubled hearts agree;
Sad from my natal hour my days have ran,
A much-afflicted, much-enduring man!
Who, suppliant to the king and peers, implores
A speedy voyage to his native shore. "
"Wise wanders, Laodam, thy erring tongue
The sports of glory to the brave belong
(Retorts Euryalus): he bears no claim
Among the great, unlike the sons of Fame.
A wandering merchant he frequents the main
Some mean seafarer in pursuit of gain;
Studious of freight, in naval trade well skill'd,
But dreads the athletic labours of the field. "
Incensed, Ulysses with a frown replies:
"O forward to proclaim thy soul unwise!
With partial hands the gods their gifts dispense;
Some greatly think, some speak with manly sense;
Here Heaven an elegance of form denies,
But wisdom the defect of form supplies;
This man with energy of thought controls,
And steals with modest violence our souls;
He speaks reservedly, but he speaks with force,
Nor can one word be changed but for a worse;
In public more than mortal he appears,
And as he moves, the praising crowd reveres;
While others, beauteous as the etherial kind,
The nobler portion went, a knowing mind,
In outward show Heaven gives thee to excel.
But Heaven denies the praise of thinking well
I'll bear the brave a rude ungovern'd tongue,
And, youth, my generous soul resents the wrong.
Skill'd in heroic exercise, I claim
A post of honour with the sons of Fame.
Such was my boast while vigour crown'd my days,
Now care surrounds me, and my force decays;
Inured a melancholy part to bear
In scenes of death, by tempest and by war
Yet thus by woes impair'd, no more I waive
To prove the hero--slander stings the brave. "

Then gliding forward with a furious bound
He wrench'd a rocky fragment from the ground
By far more ponderous, and more huge by far
Than what Phaeacia's sons discharged in air.
Fierce from his arm the enormous load he flings;
Sonorous through the shaded air it sings;
Couch'd to the earth, tempestuous as it flies,
The crowd gaze upward while it cleaves the skies.
Beyond all marks, with many a giddy round
Down-rushing, it up-turns a hill of ground.

That Instant Pallas, bursting from a cloud,
Fix'd a distinguish'd mark, and cried aloud:

"E'en he who, sightless, wants his visual ray
May by his touch alone award the day:
Thy signal throw transcends the utmost bound
Of every champion by a length of ground:
Securely bid the strongest of the train
Arise to throw; the strongest throws in vain.