Classic Poem

Canto the Fifth

The grateful prince, to show how much he loved
This noble yonth, whose merit's just reward
Too great for less abilities had proved,
Makes him commander of his daughter's guard.

Where seated in the most benign aspect
Kind love could grant to fair Pharonnida,
A sacred vision doth her hopes detect,
Whose waking joys his absence doth withdraw.

Freed from those dangers which this bold attempt
Made justly feared, whilst joy did yet exempt
Those cares, which, when by time concocted, shall
His kingdom to a general mourning call,
Sparta's pleased prince, with all the attributes
E'er gratitude learned from desert, salutes
That noble youth, which, even when hope was spent,
Kind Heaven had made his safety's instrument,
By acts of such heroic virtue, that,
Whilst all the less concerned are wondering at,
The grateful prince, in all the noble ways
Of honor, lasting as his life, repays.
By whose example the fair princess taught,
To shadow love (her soul's most perfect draught)
In friendship's veil, so free a welcome gave
The worthy stranger, that all prayer durst crave,
Though sacrificed in zeal's most perfect fire,
Seemed now from Heaven dropt on his pleased desire.
Some days spent here, whilst justice vainly sought
That treason's root, whose base production, brought
Unto an unexpected period in
Molarchus' death, with him had buried been
To future knowledge — all confessions, though
In torments they extracted were, bestow
Upon their knowledge, being the imperfect shade
Of supposition, which too weak to invade
E'en those whose doubtful loyalty looked dim,
The prudent prince, burying mistrust with him,
Leaving the island with 's triumphant fleet,
On the Sicilian shore prepares to meet
That joy in triumph which, a blessing brought,
His loyal subjects with their prayers had sought.
To cure those hot distemperatures, which in
His absence had the court's quotidian been,
The princess' guard (as being an honor due
To noble valour) having left unto
That worthy stranger, whose victorious hand
Declared a soul created for command,
The prince departs from his loved daughter's court
To joyful Corinth; where, though the resort
Of such as by their service strove to express
An uncorrupted loyalty made less
That mourning, which the kingdom's general loss
Claimed from all hearts, yet, like a sable cross,
Which amongst trophies noble conquerors bear,
All did some signs o' the public sorrow wear.
But leaving these to rectify that state
This fever shook, return to whom we late
Left gently calmed — that happy pair, which in
Desire, the shady porch of love, begin
That lasting progress, which ere ended shall
So oft their fate to strong assistance call.
Some months in happy free delights — before
Passion got strength enough to dictate more
Than Reason could write fair — they'd spent; in which
Slumber of fancy, popular love grown rich,
Soon becomes factious, and engages all
The powers of nature to procure the fall
Of the soul's lawful sovereign. Either, in
Each action of the other's, did begin
To place an adoration — she doth see
Whate'er he doth, as shining majesty
Beneath a cloud, or books, where Heaven transfers
Their oracles in unknown characters;
Like gold yet unrefined, or the adamant
Wrapt up in earth, he only seemed to want
Knowledge of worth. Her actions in his sight
Appear like fire's feigned element, with light,
But not destruction, armed; like the fair sun,
When through a crystal aqueduct he 'th run
His piercing beams, until grown temperate by
That cooling medium, through humility,
Shuns her majestic worth. In either's eyes,
The other seemed to wear such a disguise
As poets clothed their wandering gods in, when
In forms disguised they here conversed with men.
But long this conflict of their passions, ere
Resisted, lasts not; when, disdained to bear
Those leaden fetters, the great princess tries
To quench that fire i' the embryo, ere it rise
To unresisted blazes — but in vain;
What her tears smother are by sighs again
Blown into flames, such as, since not to be
By aught extinguished, her sweet modesty
Strives to conceal, nor did them more betray
Than by such fugitives as stole away
Through her fair eyes, those salliports of love,
From her besieged heart, now like to prove
(Had not her honor called the act unjust)
So feeble to betray her soul's best trust;
Her flames being not such as each vulgar breast
Feels in the fires of fancy, when oppressed
With gloomy discontents; her bright stars sat
Enthroned so high, that, like the bays of fate,
They stopped the current of the stream, and, to
The sea of honor, love's fresh rivers drew.
Thus whilst the royal eaglet doth, i' the high
Sublimer region of bright majesty,
Upon affection's wings still hover, yet,
Loath to descend, on th' humble earth doth sit;
Her worthy lover, like that amorous vine,
When, crawling o'er the weeds, it strives to twine.
Embraces with the elm, he stands; whilst she
Desires to bend, but, like that love-sick tree,
By greatness is denied. He that ne'er knew
A swelling tumor of conceit, nor flew,
Upon the waxen wings of vain ambition,
A thought above his own obscure condition,
Thinks that the princess, by her large respect
Conferred on him, but kindly doth reflect
Her father's beams; and, with a reverent zeal
Sees those descending rays, that did reveal
Love's embassies, transported on the quick
Wings of that heart-o'er-coming rhetoric,
Instructing — that the weakness of his eye,
Dazzled with beams of shining majesty,
Might, for too boldly gazing on a sight
So full of glory, be deprived of light;
Stifling his fancy, till it turned the air
That fanned his heart to flames, which pale despair
Chilled into ice soon as he went about
With them to breathe a storm of passion out.
But vain are all these fears — his eagle sight
Is born to gaze upon no lesser light
Than that from whence all other beauties in
The same sphere borrow theirs; he else had been
Degenerate from that royal eyrie whence
He first did spring, although he fell from thence
Unfledged, the growing pinions of his fame
Wanting the purple tincture of his name
And titles — both unknown; yet shall he fly,
On his own merit's strength, a pitch as high,
Though not so boldly claimed, and such as shall
Enhance the blessing, when the dull mists fall
From truth's benighted eyes, whispering in
His soul's pleased ear — her passion did begin
Whilst all the constellations of her fate,
Fixed in the zenith of bright honor, sat;
Whilst his, depressed by adverse fortune, in
Their nadir lay — even to his hopes unseen.
Whilst this enthean fire did lie concealed
With different curtains, least, by being revealed,
Cross fate, which could not quench it, should to death
Scorch all their hopes — burned in the angry breath
Of her incensed father; whilst the fair
Pharonnida was striving to repair
The wakeful ruins of the day, within
Her bed, whose down of late by love had been
Converted into thorns, she having paid
The restless tribute of her sorrow, staid
To breathe a while in broken slumbers, such
As with short blasts cool feverish brains; but much
More was in hers — A strong pathetic dream,
Diverting by enigmas nature's stream,
Long hovering through the portals of her mind
On vain phantastic wings, at length did find
The glimmerings of obstructed reason, by
A brighter beam of pure divinity
Led into supernatural light, whose rays
As much transcended roason's, as the day's
Dull mortal fires, faith apprehends to be
Beneath the glimmerings of divinity.
Her unimprisoned soul, disrobed of all
Terrestrial thoughts, (like its original
In heaven, pure and immaculate), a fit
Companion did for those bright angels sit,
Which the gods made their messengers to bear
This sacred truth, seeming transported where,
Fixed in the flaming centre of the world,
The heart o' the microcosm, 'bout which are hurled
The spangled curtains of the sky, within
Whose boundless orbs, the circling planets spin
Those threads of time, upon whose strength rely
The ponderous burthens of mortality:
An adamantine world she sees, more pure,
More glorious far than this, — framed to endure
The shock of dooms-day's darts, in which remains.
The better angels of what earth contains,
Placed there to govern all our acts, and be
A medium 'twixt us and eternity.
Hence Nature, from a labyrinth half above,
Half underneath, that sympathetic love,
Which warms the world to generation, sends
On unseen atoms; each small star attends
Here for his message, which received, is by
Their influence to the astral faculty
That lurks on earth communicated; hence
Informing Forma sends intelligence
To the material principles of earth —
Her upper garments, nature's second birth.
Upon each side of this large frame, a gate
Of different use was placed — At one there sat
A sprightly youth, whose angel's form delights
Eyes dimmed with age, whose blandishments invites
Infants i' the womb to court their woe, and be
By his false shape tempted to misery.
Millions of thousands swarm about him, though
Diseases do each minute strive to throw
Them from his presence; since, being tempted by
His flattering form, all court it, though they lie
On beds of thorns to look on 't, saving some
More wretched malecontents, that hither come
With souls so sullen, that, whilst Time invites
Them to his joys, they shun those smooth delights.
This, the world's favorite, had a younger brother
Of different hue, each more unlike the other
Then opposite aspects; antipathy
Within their breast, though they were forced to be
Almost inseparable, dwelt. This fiend
A passage guarded, which at the other end
O' the spacious structure stood; betwixt each gate
Was placed a labyrinth, in whose angles sat
The Vanities of life, attempting to
Stay death's pale harbingers, but that black clew,
Time's dusky girdle, Fate's arithmetic,
Griefs, slow, snail-paced, Joys more than eagle-quick, —
That chain whose links composed of hours and days,
Thither at length spite of delay conveys
The slow paced steps of time. There always stood
Near him one of the triple sisterhood,
Who, with deformity in love, did send
Him troops of servants, hourly to attend
Upon his harsh commands, which he, from all
Society of flesh, without the wall,
Down a dark hill conveyed; at whose foot stood
An ugly lake, black as that horrid flood,
Gods made by men did fear. Myriads of boats,
On the dark surface of the water floats,
Containing passengers, whose different hue,
Tell them that from the walls do trembling view
Their course — that there 's no age of man to be
Exempted from that powerful tyranny.
A tide, which ne'er shall know reflux, beyond
The baleful stream, unto a gloomy strond,
Circled with black obscurity, conveys
Each passenger, where their torn chain of days
Is in eternity peeked up. Between
These different gates, the princess having seen
Life's various scenes wrought to a method by
Disposing angels, on a rock more high
Than nature's common surface, she beholds
The mansion house of Fate, which thus unfolds
Its sacred mysteries: — A trine within
A quadrate placed, both those encompassed in
A perfect circle, was its form; but what
Its matter was — for us to wonder at —
Is undiscovered left; a tower there stands
At every angle, where Time's fatal hands,
The impartial Parcae, dwell. — I' the first she sees
Clothe, the kindest of the Destinies,
From immaterial essences to cull
The seeds of life, and of them frame the wool
For Lachesis to spin; about her fly
Myriads of souls that yet want flesh to lie
Warmed with their functions in, whose strength bestows
That power by which man ripe for misery grows.
Her next of objects was that glorious tower,
Where that swift fingered nymph that spares no hour
From mortal's service, draws the various threads
Of life in several lengths — to weary beds
Of age extending some, whilst others in
Their infancy are broke; some blacked in sin,
Others, the favorites of heaven, from whence
Their origin, candid with innocence;
Some purpled in afflictions, others dyed
In sanguine pleasures; some in glittering pride,
Spun to adorn the earth, whilst others wear
Rags of deformity; but knots of care
No thread was wholly freed from. Next to this
Fair glorious tower was placed that black abyss
Of dreadful Atropos, the baleful seat
Of death and horror; in each room replete
With lazy damps, loud groans, and the sad sight
Of pale grim ghosts — those terrors of the night.
To this, the last stage that the winding clew
Of life can lead mortality unto,
Fear was the dreadful porter, which let in
All guests sent thither by destructive Sin.
As its firm basis, on all these depends
A lofty pyramid, to which each sends
Some gift from nature's treasury to Fame's
Uncertain hand. The hollow room with names
And empty sounds was only filled, of those
For whom the Destinies 'dained to compose
Their fairest threads; as if but born to die —
Here all Ephemeras of report did fly
On feeble wings, till, being like to fall,
Some faintly stick upon the slimy wall,
Till the observant antiquary rents
Them thence to live in paper monuments;
In whose records they are preserved to be —
The various censures of posterity.
I' the upper room, as favorites to Fate,
There only Poets, rich in fancy, sat;
In that beneath — Historians, whose records
Do themes unto those pregnant wits afford;
Yet both preparing everlasting bays
To crown their glorious dust, whose happy days
Were here spent well. Beneath these, covered o'er
With dim oblivion's shadows, myriads more,
Till dooms-day shall the gaudy world undress,
Lay huddled up in dark forgetfulness.
All which, as objects not of worth to cast
A fixed eye on, the princess' genius past.
In heedless haste, until obstructed by
Visions, that thus fixed her soul's wandering eye.
A light, as great as if that dooms-day's flame
Were for a lamp hung in the court of Fame,
Directs her — where on a bright throne there sat
Sicilia's better Genius: her proud state
(Courted by all earth's greatest monarchs) by
Three valiant knights supported was, whose high
Merits, disdaining a reward less great,
With equal hopes aimed at the royal seat;
Which since all could not gain, betwixt her three
Fair daughters both her crown and dignity
Is equally bestowed, by giving one
To each of them. When the divided throne
Had on each angle fixed a diadem,
Her vision thus proceeds: — The royal stem
That bore her father's crown, to view first brings
Its golden fruit — a glorious race of kings,
Led by the founder of their fame, their rear
Brought by her father up; next, those that bear
Epirus' honored arms, the royal train
Concluding in Zoranza; this linked chain
Drawn to an end, the princes that had swayed
Argalia's sceptre, fill the scene, till, stayed
By the Epirot's sword, their conquered crown
From aged Gelon's hoary head dropt down
At fierce Zoranza's feet. This she beholds
With admiration, whilst hid truth unfolds
Itself in plainer objects: — The distressed
Ætolian prince again appears, but dressed
In a poor pilgrim's weed; in's hand he leads
A lovely boy, in whose sweet look she reads
Soft Pity's lectures; but whilst gazing on
This act, till lost in admiration,
By sudden fate he seemed transformed to what
She last beheld him, only offering at
Love's shrine his heart to her Idea. There
Joy had bereaved her slumbers, had not fear
Clouded the glorious dream — A dreadful mist,
Black as the steams of hell, seeming to twist
Its ugly vapors into shades more thick
Than night-engendering damps, had with a quick
But horrid darkness veiled the room; to augment
Whose terror, a cloud's sulphury bosom, rent
With dreadful thunder-claps, darting a bright
But fearful blaze through the artificial night,
Lent her so much use of her eyes — to see
Argalia groveling in his blood, which she
Had scarce beheld ere the malignant flame
Vanished again — She shrieks, and on his name
Doth passionately call; but here no sound
Startles her ear but hollow groans, which drowned
Her soul in a cold sweat of fears. Which ended,
A second blaze lends her its light, attended
With objects, whose wild horror did present
Her father's ghost, then seeming to lament
Her injured honor. In his company
The slain Laconian's spirit, which, let free
From the dark prison of the cold grave, where
In rusty chains he lay, was come to bear
Her to that sad abode; but, as she now
Appeared to sink, a golden cloud did bow
From heaven's fair arch, in which Argalia seemed,
Clad in bright armour, sitting, who redeemed
Her from approaching danger; which being done,
The darkness vanished, and a glorious sun
Of welcome light displayed its beams; by which,
A throne the first resembling, but more rich
In its united glory, to the eye
Presents its lustre, where in majesty,
The angels that attend their better fate,
Placed her and brave Argalia. — In which state,
The unbarred portals of her soul let fly
The golden slumber, whose dear memory
Shall live within her noble thoughts, until,
Treading o'er all obstructions, fate fulfil
These dark predictions, whose obscurity
Must often first her soul's affliction be.
When now the morning's dews — that cool allay
Which cures the fevers of the intemperate day, —
Were rarified to air, the princess, to
Improve her joy in private thoughts, withdrew
From burthensome society within
A silent grove's cool shadows — what had been
Her midnight's joy to recollect. In which
Delightful task, whilst memory did enrich
The robes of fancy, to divert the stream
Of thoughts, intentive only on her dream,
Argalia enters, with a speed that showed
He unto some supreme commander owed
That diligence; but, when arrived so near
As to behold, stopped with a reverent fear,
Least this intrusion on her privacies
Might ruffle passion, which now floating lies
In a calm stream of thoughts. He stays till she
By her commands gave fresh activity
To his desires, then with a lowly grace,
Yet such to which Pride's haughty sons gave place
For native sweetness, he on 's knee presents
A packet from her father, whose contents,
If love can groan beneath a greater curse
Than desperation, made her sufferings worse
Than fear could represent them — 'twas expressed
In language that not wholly did request,
Nor yet command consent; only declare
His royal will, and the paternal care
He bore his kingdom's safety, which could be
By nought confirmed more than affinity
With the Laconian prince, whose big fame stood
Exalted in a spacious sea of blood,
On honor's highest pyramid. His hand
Had made the triple-headed spot of land
One of her stately promontories bow
Beneath his sword, and with his sceptre now
He at the other reaches; which, if love
But gently smile on 's new-born hopes, and prove
Propitious as the god of war, his fate
Climbs equal with his wishes. But too late
That slow-paced soldier bent his forces to
Storm that fair virgin citadel, which knew,
Ere his pretences could a parley call,
Beneath what force that royal fort must fall.
Enclosed within this rough lord's letter, she
Received his picture, which informed her he
Wanted dissimulation (that worst part
Of courtship) to put complements of art
On his effigies; his stern brow far more
Glorying i' the scars, than in the crown he wore
His active youth made him retainer to
The court of Mars, something too long to sue
For entrance into Love's; like mornings clad
In grizzled frosts, ere plump-cheeked Autumn had
Shorn the glebe's golden locks, some silver hairs
Mixed with his black appeared; his age despairs
Not of a hopeful heir, nor could his youth
Promise much more; the venerable truth
Of glorious victories, that stuck his name
For ornament i' the frontispiece of fame,
Together with his native greatness, were
His orators to plead for love: but where
Youth, beauty, valor, and a soul as brave,
Though not known great as his, before had gave
Love's pleasing wounds, fortune's neglected gain,
In fresh assaults, but spends her strength in vain.
With as much ease as souls, when ripened by
A well spent life, haste to eternity,
She had sustained this harsh encounter, though
Backed with her father's threats, did it not show
More dreadful yet — in a command which must
Call her Argalia from his glorious trust;
Her guardian to a separation in
An embassy to him, whose hopes had been
Her new-created fears. Which sentence read
By the wise lady, though her passions bred
A sudden tumult, yet her reason stays
The torrent, till Argalia, who obeys
The strictest limits of observance to
Her he adored, being reverently withdrew,
Enlarged her sorrow in so loud a tone,
That ere he 's through the winding labyrinth gone
So far, but that he could distinctly hear
Her sad complaints, they thus assault his ear: —
" Unhappy soul! born only to infuse
Pearls of delight with vinegar, and lose
Content for honor; is 't a sin to be
Born high, that robs me of my liberty?
Or is 't the curse of greatness to behold
Virtue through such false optics as unfold
No splendor, less from equal orbs they shine?
What heaven made free, ambitious men confine
In regular degrees. Poor love must dwell
Within no climate but what's parallel
Unto our honored births; the envied fate
Of princes oft these burthens finds from state,
When lowly swains, knowing no parent's voice
A negative, make a free happy choice. " —
And here she sighed; then with some drops, distilled
From Love's most sovereign elixir, filled
The crystal fountains of her eyes, which e'er
Dropped down, she thus recals again — " But ne'er,
Ne'er, my Argalia, shall these fears destroy
My hopes of thee: Heaven! let me but enjoy
So much of all those blessings, which their birth
Can take from frail mortality; and earth,
Contracting all her curses, cannot make
A storm of danger loud enough to shake
Me to a trembling penitence; a curse,
To make the horror of my suffering worse,
Sent in a father's name, like vengeance fell
From angry Heaven, upon my head may dwell
In an eternal stain, — my honored name
With pale disgrace may languish, — busy fame
My reputation spot, — affection be
Termed uncommanded lust, — sharp poverty,
That weed which kills the gentle flower of love,
As the result of all these ills, may prove
My greatest misery, — unless to find
Myself unpitied. Yet not so unkind
Would I esteem this mercenary band,
As those far more malignant powers that stand,
Armed with dissuasions, to obstruct the way
Fancy directs; but let those souls obey
Their harsh commands, that stand in fear to shed
Repentant tears: I am resolved to tread
These doubtful paths, through all the shades of fear
That now benight them. Love! with pity hear
Thy suppliant's prayers, and when my clouded eyes
Shall cease to weep, in smiles I 'll sacrifice
To thee such offerings, that the utmost date
Of Death's rough hands shall never violate. "
Whilst our fair virgin sufferer was in
This agony, Argalia, that had been
Attentive as an envied tyrant to
Suspected counsels, from her language drew
So much, that that pure essence, which informs
His knowledge, shall in all the future storms
Of fate protect him, from a fear that did
Far more than death afflict, whilst love lay hid
In honor's upper region. Now, whilst she
Calmly withdraws, to let her comforts be —
Hopes of's return, his latest view forsook
His soul's best comfort, who hath now betook
Herself to private thoughts; where, with what rest
Love can admit, I leave her, and him blest
In a most prosperous voyage, but happier far
In being directed by so bright a star.