THE

SECULAR POEM.

The Poet to the People.

STAND off, ye vulgar, nor profane,

With bold, unhallow'd sounds, this festal scene: In hymns inspir'd by truth divine,

I, priest of the melodious Nine,

To youths and virgins sing the mystic strain.

To the Chorus of Youths and Virgins.

PHEBUS taught me how to sing,

How to tune the vocal string;
Phoebus made me known to Fame,
Honour'd with a poet's name.

Noble youths, and virgins fair,
Chaste Diana's guardian care
(Goddess, whose unerring dart
Stops the lynx, or flying hart),
Mark the Lesbian measures well,
Where they fall, and where they swell;
And in varied cadence sing,
As I strike the changing string.
To the god, who gilds the skies,
Let the solemn numbers rise;
Solemn sing the queen of night,
And her crescent's bending light,
Which adown the fruitful year
Rolls the months in prone career.
Soon, upon her bridal day,
Thus the joyful maid shall say:

When the great revolving year
Bade the festal morn appear,
High the vocal hymn I rais'd,
And the listening gods were pleas'd:
All the vocal hymn divine,
Horace, tuneful bard, was thine.

FIRST CONCERT.

HYMN TO APOLLO.

Chorus of Youths and Virgins.

TITYOS, with impious lust inspir'd,

By chaste Latona's beauties fir'd,
Thy wrath, O Phœbus, tried ;

And Niobe, of tongue profane,
Deplor'd her numerous offspring slain,
Sad victims of their mother's pride.

Achilles too, the son of Fame,

Though sprung from Thetis, sea-born dame,
And first of men in fight,

Though warring with tremendous spear
He shook the Trojan towers with fear,
Yet bow'd to thy superior might;

The cypress, when by storms impell'd,
Or pine, by biting axes fell'd,

Low bends the towering head:
So falling on th' ensanguin'd plain,
By your unerring arrow slain,

His mighty bulk the hero spread.

He had not Priam's heedless court,
Dissolv'd in wine, and festal sport,

With midnight art surpris'd;

But bravely bold, of open force,
Had proudly scorn'd Minerva's horse,
And all its holy cheat despis'd;

Then arm'd, alas! with horrors dire,
Wide-wasting with resistless ire,

Into the flames had thrown
Infants, upon whose faltering tongue
Their words in formless accents hung,
Infants to light and life unknown:

But charm'd by beauty's queen and thee,
The sire of gods, with just decree
Assenting, shook the skies;

That Troy should change th' imperial seat,
And, guided by a better fate,

Glorious in distant realms should rise.

Oh! may the god, who could inspire
With living sounds the Grecian lyre;
In Xanthus' lucid stream

Who joys to bathe his flowing hair,
Now make the Latian muse his care,

And powerful guard her rising fame!

SECOND CONCERT.

Chorus of Youths.

E virgins, sing Diana's praise.

*YE

Chorus of Virgins.

Ye boys, let youthful Phœbus crown your lays.

The Two Choirs.

Together let us raise the voice

To her, belov'd by Jove supreme;
Let fair Latona be the theme,

Our tuneful theme, his beauteous choice.

The twenty-first Ode of the first Book.

Ye virgins, sing Diana's fame,

Who bathes delighted in the limpid stream;
Dark Erymanthus' awful groves,

The woods that Algidus o'erspread,
Or wave on Cragus' verdant head,
Joyous th' immortal huntress loves.

Chorus of Virgins.

Ye boys, with equal honour sing
Fair Tempe cloth'd with ever-blooming spring;
Then hail the Delian birth divine,

Whose shoulders, beaming heavenly fire,
Grac'd with his brother's warbling lyre,

And with the golden quiver shine.

Chorus of Youths and Virgins.

Mov'd by the solemn voice of prayer, They both shall make imperial Rome their care, And gracious turn the direful woes Of famine and of weeping war

From Rome, from sacred Cæsar far,

And pour them on our British foes.

THIRD CONCERT.

TO APOLLO AND DIANA.

Chorus of Youths and Virgins.

YE radiant glories of the skies,

Ever-beaming god of light,

Sweetly-shining queen of night,

Beneath whose wrath the wood-born savage dies; Ye powers, to whom with ceaseless praise A grateful world its homage pays,

Let our prayer, our prayer be heard,
Now in this solemn hour preferr'd,
When by the Sibyl's dread command,

Of spotless maids a chosen train,

Of spotless youths a chosen band,

To all our guardian gods uplift the hallow'd. strain.

Chorus of Youths.

Fair Sun, who with unchanging beam

Rising another and the same,

Dost from thy beamy car unfold

The glorious day,

Or hide it in thy setting ray,,
Of light and life immortal source,
Mayst thou, in all thy radiant course,

Nothing more great than seven-hill'd Rome behold!

Chorus of Virgins.

Goddess of the natal hour,

Or, if other name more dear,

Propitious power,

Can charm your ear,

Our pregnant matrons gracious hear:
With lenient hand their pangs compose,

Heal their agonizing throes;
Give the springing birth to light,

And with every genial grace,

Prolific of an endless race,

Oh! crown our marriage-laws, and bless the nuptial rite:

Chorus of Youths and Virgins.

That when the circling years complete
Again this awful season bring,

Thrice with the day's revolving light,

Thrice beneath the shades of night,

In countless bands our youthful choirs may sing These festal hymns, these pious games repeat.