No More Learning

With him the strength of war, the soldier's pride,
Our second hope to great Achilles, died!
Touch'd at the sight from tears I scarce refrain,
And tender sorrow thrills in every vein;
Pensive and sad I stand, at length accost
With accents mild the inexorable ghost:
'Still burns thy rage? and can brave souls resent
E'en after death? Relent, great shade, relent!
Perish those arms which by the gods' decree
Accursed our army with the loss of thee!
With thee we fall; Greece wept thy hapless fates,
And shook astonish'd through her hundred states;
Not more, when great Achilles press'd the ground,
And breathed his manly spirit through the wound.
O deem thy fall not owed to man's decree,
Jove hated Greece, and punish'd Greece in thee!
Turn then; oh peaceful turn, thy wrath control,
And calm the raging tempest of thy soul. '

"While yet I speak, the shade disdains to stay,
In silence turns, and sullen stalks away.

"Touch'd at his sour retreat, through deepest night,
Through hell's black bounds I had pursued his flight,
And forced the stubborn spectre to reply;
But wondrous visions drew my curious eye.
High on a throne, tremendous to behold,
Stern Minos waves a mace of burnish'd gold;
Around ten thousand thousand spectres stand
Through the wide dome of Dis, a trembling band
Still as they plead, the fatal lots he rolls,
Absolves the just, and dooms the guilty souls.

"The huge Orion, of portentous size,
Swift through the gloom a giant-hunter flies:
A ponderous mace of brass with direful sway
Aloft he whirls, to crush the savage prey!
Stern beasts in trains that by his truncheon fell,
Now grisly forms, shoot o'er the lawns of hell.

"There Tityus large and long, in fetters bound,
O'erspreads nine acres of infernal ground;
Two ravenous vultures, furious for their food,
Scream o'er the fiend, and riot in his blood,
Incessant gore the liver in his breast,
The immortal liver grows, and gives the immortal feast.
For as o'er Panope's enamell'd plains
Latona journey'd to the Pythian fanes,
With haughty love the audacious monster strove
To force the goddess, and to rival Jove.
"There Tantalus along the Stygian bounds
Pours out deep groans (with groans all hell resounds);
E'en in the circling floods refreshment craves,
And pines with thirst amidst a sea of waves;
When to the water he his lip applies,
Back from his lip the treacherous water flies.
Above, beneath, around his hapless head,
Trees of all kinds delicious fruitage spread;
There figs, sky-dyed, a purple hue disclose,
Green looks the olive, the pomegranate glows.
There dangling pears exalting scents unfold.
And yellow apples ripen into gold;
The fruit he strives to seize; but blasts arise,
Toss it on high, and whirl it to the skies.

"I turn'd my eye, and as I turn'd survey'd
A mournful vision! the Sisyphian shade;
With many a weary step, and many a groan,
Up the high hill he heaves a huge round stone;
The huge round stone, resulting with a bound,
Thunders impetuous down, and smokes along the ground.
Again the restless orb his toil renews,
Dust mounts in clouds, and sweat descends in dews.

"Now I the strength of Hercules behold,
A towering spectre of gigantic mould,
A shadowy form! for high in heaven's abodes
Himself resides, a god among the gods;
There in the bright assemblies of the skies.
He nectar quaffs, and Hebe crowns his joys.
Here hovering ghosts, like fowl, his shade surround,
And clang their pinions with terrific sound;
Gloomy as night he stands, in act to throw
The aerial arrow from the twanging bow.
Around his breast a wondrous zone is roll'd,
Where woodland monsters grin in fretted gold;
There sullen lions sternly seem to roar,
The bear to growl to foam the tusky boar;
There war and havoc and destruction stood,
And vengeful murder red with human blood.
Thus terribly adorned the figures shine,
Inimitably wrought with skill divine.
The mighty good advanced with awful look,
And, turning his grim visage, sternly spoke:

"'O exercise in grief! by arts refined;
O taught to bear the wrongs of base mankind!
Such, such was I!