When to conditions of unequal peace
He shall submit, then may he not possess
Kingdom nor life, and find his funeral

I' the' sands when he before his day shall fall!
And ye, oh Tyrians! with immortal hate
Pursue this race; this service dedicate
To my deplored ashes: let there be
"Twixt us and them no league nor amity.
May from my bones a new Achilles rise,
That shall infest the Trojan colonies

With fire, and sword, and famine; when at length
Time to our great attempts contributes strength!
Our seas, our shores, our armies, theirs oppose,
And may our children be for ever foes!'
A ghastly paleness death's approach portends,
Then, trembling, she the fatal pile ascends;
Viewing the Trojan relics, she unsheath'd
Æneas' sword, not for that use bequeath'd;
Then on the guilty bed she gently lays
Herself, and softly thus lamenting prays:
'Dear relics! whilst that gods and fates give leave,
Free me from care, and my glad soul receive.
That date which Fortune gave, I now must end,
And to the shades a noble ghost descend.
Sichæus' blood, by his false brother spilt,
I have revenged, and a proud city built.
Happy, alas! too happy, I had lived,
Had not the Trojan on my coast arrived.
But shall I die without revenge? yet die
Thus, thus with joy to thy Sichæus fly.
My conscious foe my funeral fire shall view
From sea, and may that omen him pursue !'
Her fainting hand let fall the sword besmear'd
With blood, and then the mortal wound appear'd.

Through all the court the fright and clamours rise,
Which the whole city fills with fears and cries,
As loud as if her Carthage or old Tyre
The foe had enter'd, and had set on fire.
Amazed Anne with speed ascends the stairs,
And in her arms her dying sister rears;

Did you for this yourself and me beguile?
For such an end did I erect this pile?
Did you so much despise me, in this fate
Myself with you not to associate?

Yourself and me, alas! this fatal wound
The senate and the people doth confound.
I'll wash her wound with tears, and at her death
My lips from her's shall draw her parting breath.'
Then with her vest the wound she wipes and dries;
Thrice with her arm the Queen attempts to rise,
But her strength failing, falls into a swoon,
Life's last efforts yet striving with her wound:
Thrice on her bed she turns, with wandering sight
Seeking she groans when she beholds the light.
Then Juno, pitying her disastrous fate,
Sends Iris down her pangs to mitigate.
(Since if we fall before the' appointed day
Nature and Death continue long their fray.)
Iris descends; This fatal lock (says she)
To Pluto I bequeath, and set thee free;'

Then clips her hair: cold numbness straight bereaves Her corpse of sense, and the' air her soul receives.

SARPEDON'S SPEECH TO GLAUCUS,

IN THE TWELFTH BOOK OF HOMER.

THUS to Glaucus spake

Divine Sarpedon, since he did not find
Others as great in place as great in mind.
'Above the rest why is our pomp, our power,
Our flocks, our herds, and our possessions more?
Why all the tributes land and sea affords,
Heap'd in great chargers, load our sumptuous
boards?

Our cheerful guests carouse the sparkling tears
Of the rich grape, whilst music charms their ears.
Why as we pass do those on Xanthus' shore
As gods behold us, and as gods adore?
But that, as well in danger as degree,
We stand the first; that when our Licians see
Our brave examples, they admiring say,
Behold our gallant leaders! these are they
Deserve the greatness, and unenvied stand,
Since what they act transcends what they command.
Could the declining of this fate (oh, friend!)
Our date to immortality extend?

Or if death sought not them who seek not death,
Would I advance? or should my vainer breath
With such a glorious folly thee inspire?
But since with Fortune Nature doth conspire,
Since age, disease, or some less noble end,
Though not less certain, doth our days attend;
Since 'tis decreed, and to this period lead
A thousand ways, the noblest path we'll tread,
And bravely on till they, or we, or all,
A common sacrifice to honour fall,'

CATO MAJOR.

TO THE READER.

I CAN neither call this piece Tully's nor my own, being much altered from the original, not only by the change of the style, but by addition and subtraction. I believe you will be better pleased to receive it, as I did, at the first sight; for to me Cicero did not so much appear to write, as Cato to speak: and, to do right to my author, I believe no character of any person was ever better drawn to the life than this. Therefore, neither consider Cicero nor me, but Cato himself, who being then raised from the dead to speak the language of that age and place, neither the distance of place or time makes it less possible to raise him now to speak ours.

Though I dare not compare my copy with the original, yet you will find it mentioned here how much fruits are improved by graffing; and here, by graffing verse upon prose, some of these severer arguments may receive a more mild and pleasant taste.

Cato says (in another place) of himself, that he learned to speak Greek between the seventieth aud eightieth year of his age: beginning that so late, he may not yet be too old to learn English, being now but between his seventeenth and eighteenth hundred year. For these reasons I shall leave to this piece no other name than what the author gave it, of Cato Major.

PREFACE.

THAT learned critic, the younger Scaliger, comparing the two great orators, says, that nothing can be taken from Demosthenes, nor added to Tully; and if there be any fault in the last, it is the resumption or dwelling too long upon his arguments: for which reason, having intended to translate this piece into prose, (where translation ought to be strict) finding the matter very proper for verse, I took the liberty to leave out what was only necessary to that age and place, and to take or add what was proper to this present age and occasion, by laying his sense closer, and in fewer words, according to the style and ear of these times. The three first parts I dedicate to my old friends, to take off those melancholy reflections which the sense of age, infirmity, and death, may give them. The last part I think necessary for the conviction of those many who believe not, or at least mind not, the immortality of the soul, of which the Scripture speaks only positively as a lawgiver, with an ipse dixit; but it may be, they neither believe that, (from which they either make doubts or sport) nor those whose business it is to interpret it, supposing they do it only for their own ends but if a heathen philosopher bring such arguments from reason, nature, and second causes, which none of our atheistical sophisters can confute, if they may stand convinced that there is an immortality of the soul, I hope they will so weigh the consequences as neither to talk nor live as if there was no such thing.