Classic Poem

IRENE.
Aspasia, yet pursue the sacred theme;
Exhaust the stores of pious eloquence,
And teach me to repel the sultan's passion.
Still, at Aspasia's voice, a sudden rapture
Exalts my soul, and fortifies my heart;
The glitt'ring vanities of empty greatness,
The hopes and fears, the joys and pains of life,
Dissolve in air, and vanish into nothing.

ASPASIA.
Let nobler hopes and juster fears succeed,
And bar the passes of Irene's mind
Against returning guilt.

IRENE.
When thou art absent,
Death rises to my view, with all his terrours;
Then visions, horrid as a murd'rer's dreams,
Chill my resolves, and blast my blooming virtue:
Stern torture shakes his bloody scourge before me,
And anguish gnashes on the fatal wheel.

ASPASIA.
Since fear predominates in ev'ry thought,
And sways thy breast with absolute dominion,
Think on th' insulting scorn, the conscious pangs,
The future mis'ries, that wait th' apostate;
So shall timidity assist thy reason,
And wisdom into virtue turn thy frailty.

IRENE.
Will not that pow'r, that form'd the heart of woman,
And wove the feeble texture of her nerves,
Forgive those fears that shake the tender frame?

ASPASIA.
The weakness we lament, ourselves create;
Instructed, from our infant years, to court,
With counterfeited fears, the aid of man,
We learn to shudder at the rustling breeze,
Start at the light, and tremble in the dark;
Till, affectation ripening to belief,
And folly, frighted at her own chimeras,
Habitual cowardice usurps the soul.

IRENE.
Not all, like thee, can brave the shocks of fate.
Thy soul, by nature great, enlarg'd by knowledge,
Soars unincumber'd with our idle cares,
And all Aspasia, but her beauty's man.

ASPASIA.
Each gen'rous sentiment is thine, Demetrius,
Whose soul, perhaps, yet mindful of Aspasia,
Now hovers o'er this melancholy shade,
Well pleas'd to find thy precepts not forgotten.
Oh! could the grave restore the pious hero,
Soon would his art or valour set us free,
And bear us far from servitude and crimes.

IRENE.
He yet may live.

ASPASIA.
Alas! delusive dream!
Too well I know him; his immoderate courage,
Th' impetuous sallies of excessive virtue,
Too strong for love, have hurried him on death.