THE

RUINES OF ROME:

BY BELLAY.*

I.

YE heavenly spirites, whose ashie cinders lie
Under deep ruines, with huge walls opprest,
But not your praise, the which shall never die
Through your faire verses, ne in ashes rest;
If so be shrilling voyce of wight alive
May reach from hence to depth of darkest hell,
Then let those deep abysses open rive,
That ye may understand my shreiking yell!
Thrice having seene under the heavens veale
Your toombs devoted compasse over all,
Thrice unto you with lowd voyce I appeale,
And for your antique furie here doo call,

* Joachim du Bellay, a French poet, of considerable reputation in his day, who died about the middle of the sixteenth century. He was one of the seven poets who were called by the name of Pleiades. The title (translated) of the original of the following version is "The first book of the antiquities of Rome, containing a general description of its greatness and also a lamentation for its decay." At the end of this poem (in the edition of Bellay's poems, published at Rouen, in 1597) are the fifteen Visions, (Songes, Fr.,) which Spenser has also translated.

The whiles that I with sacred horror sing
Your glorie, fairest of all earthly thing!

II.

Great Babylon her haughtie walls will praise,
And sharped steeples high shot up in ayre;
Greece will the olde Ephesian buildings blaze;
And Nylus nurslings their Pyramides faire;
The same yet vaunting Greece will tell the storie
Of loves great Image in Olympus placed;
Mansolus worke will be the Carians glorie;
And Crete will boast the Labyrinth, now raced1;
The antique Rhodian will likewise set forth.
The great Colosse, erect to Memorie;

And what els in the world is of like worth,

Some greater learned wit will magnifie.

But I will sing above all moniments

Seven Romane Hils, the worlds Seven Wonderments.

III.

Thou stranger, which for Rome in Rome here seekest,
And nought of Rome in Rome perceivst at all,
These same olde walls, olde arches, which thou seest,
Olde palaces, is that which Rome men call.
Beholde what wreake, what ruine, and what wast,
And how that she, which with her mightie powre
Tam'd all the world, hath tam'd herselfe at last;
The pray
of Time, which all things doth devowre!
Rome now of Rome is th' onely funerall,
And onely Rome of Rome hath victorie;
Ne ought save Tyber hastning to his fall
Remaines of all: O worlds inconstancie!
That which is firme doth flit and fall away,
And that is flitting doth abide and stay.

1 Raced, razed.