200

Not on the thirsty glebe ambrosial rain
So opes its bosom for the teeming grain,
As sweet religion's heaven-descended dews
Their mild effects o'er social life diffuse;
Then holier shrines in mortal breasts are rear'd,
And truth is sacred when a God's rever'd.
Let hope and fear compact the moral chain, 205
A stronger power than man may man restrain;
These are the springs invisible above,
The human will to good or ill to move:
All virtue else in the tempestuous mind,
Is weak, as Bibulus to Cæsar join'd:
Who, without these the passions would command,
But holds a tyger in a flowery band.

210

+

• Bibulus was Cæsar's colleague in the consulship, and at first made some attempts to control him, but was soon obliged to desist, and to pass in entire insignificance the remainder of his nominal magistracy. This year of Rome was called the consulship of Julius and Cæsar.

LUCIUS

+ Fleet as the Stag thrunwieldy Stee; shall run,

Streams back iuauids 1011, of shadows meet the SLL12,
Eve the foul mass of Mart's impeifect kind
Norpurgid by Heaven, shall Leave its dioss behind.

LUCIUS JUNIUS BRUTUS,

Man's love of life beyond even life extends,
Begins with breath, nor leaves him when it ends :
Pleas’d with renew'd existence, he believes 215
A second being in his heirs revives.
Yet see relentless Brutus, plac'd on high,
Devote his sons to death, and view them die.
Their youth, their conscious shame for the offence,
Turn advocates more strong than innocence; 220
And soft compassion had their doom delay'd,
But oh! the inexorable father sway'd.
Not instantaneous were the sufferers' pains ; ?
The li&tor's scourge first tore their spouting veins;
Then stooping mangled to the bloody block, 225
Their forfeit necks receiv'd the severing shok .

8

7 Exuit patrem ut consulem ageret, orbusque vivere quam publicæ vindictæ deesse maluit. Val. Max. 1. v. c. viii.

παντα τα σερι την τιμωριαν εθη και νομιμα φυλατίων, οσα τους κακεργους αποκείθαι παθειν, εν αγορα, σαντων ορωνίων, αικιθεντας τα σωμαία πληγαις αυλες, απασι τοις γινομενοις παρων, τοτε συνεχώρησε τες αυχενας τους πελεκεσιν αποκοDion. Hal. 1. v.

Unmoy'd

Unmov'd he sat ; 9 while tears and

9 while tears and groans confessid
The heaving pangs of every other breast.
O heart of triple brass! can love of fame
Extinguish nature, to exalt a name?

230
Serenely could thine eye a sight behold,
Which chills the stranger's vital tide, when told ?
What praise, alas ! can fortitude receive,
Which none would imitate, nor all believe ?
Take then, inhuman! thy ambition's lot ;
Thy pride’s remember'd, and their crime forgot.
Amazement filld the throng ;-—the general ire
Was lost in horrour at the obdurate sire;
While justice, pausing, trembled to divide
The patriot's title with the parricide.
Preposterous scene! Consul rever'd and curst;
Faithful to Rome, to nature's laws unjust!

235

240

9

YTTEP απανία δε τα παραδοξα και θαυμασα τα ανδρος, το ατενες της οψεως και το ατεγκτον ην" ---μονος ντε ανακλανσαμενος ωφθη τον μορον των παιδων, 11ε αποιμωξας εαυτού της καθεξισης των οικον ερημιάς. DION. HAL. 1. ν.

D

Posterity

1

Posterity the dread award repeals;
More for the traitors than the judge she feels;
Averts with shuddering awe th’astonish'd gaze, 245
And gives, at best, but wonder for thy praise.
Had any voice but thine pronounc'd their doom,
No pitying sigh had grac'd their guilty tomb:
Had other eyes at their sad fate look'd on,
The tears of Rome had fall’n for thee alone; 250
But in thy children's vital blood array’d, -
Stern justice turns a monster, so display'd.
Virtues o’erstrain’d, like strings in musick, fly,
Or, jarring, spoil sweet nature's harmony;
And actions, where humanity must frown, 255
Excite but horror, not deserve renown.9

TRIBUNES.

.

I

9 We find from Virgil, that even the hard-hearted Romans were divided in their opinion upon this most extraordinary transaction :

utcunque ferent ea facta minores,” Virg. Æn. vi. Manlius, however, presents another example of still more extravagant and unnatural rigour, when he condemns his son, a gallant young conqueror, to death, for a slight deviation from discipline. This barbarian,

after 6. Thy Colles-sue in thy pouver and office shard What he might have dondemnd, thou shoud's have spard, Indulging Rigour in its dire exccés, Thou, striving to be more than 12an, at less. yet ler not one outtia geolis, Deed suffice k'o veillis mcrit från diiring eyes, Juust to his nobler flame che Melide shall pay The brave Mcall's ivorch her tributan

taryláy:

Ere time's slow current in his gradual course
Had purg'd the foulness of Rome's natal source,
Who could expect in her young state to see
High birth assum'd, and pride of family? 260
To see the outlaw's, ruffian's, robber's brood,
Puffd with pre-eminence of noble blood ?

after exhorting the young man in an unfeeling declamation to bear his fate with magnanimity, ordered his head to be struck off, and looke: on at the execution of the sentence. It is reasonable to suppose that the power of life and death given by the Roman laws to parents over their children, might, in some degree, have weakened the ties of natural affection, and substituted in their place ideas of severity, which led to excesses otherwise unaccountable. Parents had it in their option either to bring up a new-born child, or to suffer it to perish: thus, what would among us be considered as the most extreme proof of inhumanity, was then looked upon as a matter of indifference. The whole youth of Rome were in a state of actual Navery; with this difference only, that their masters were their fathers. Among Catiline's conspirators was A. Fulvius,“ senatoris filius ; quem retractum ex itinere parens necari jussit.” This parental order is mentioned by Sallust, whose words I have just now quoted. This is the state, from which declaimers are fond of taking their images of liberty.

D.2

2.11t see

Sມາ
Almointed Heads his Denunciation hea,
That chased from Rome : brutal Kavisher:

Tought the proudl Heirs of hoyalty to owon
Man's Rights more sacred than 2 Tyrant's Throne,
And to all Crowns this awful lesson brings,
"

Yet,

1

"