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And tow'rs of strength were men, high-minded men,

Who heard the cry of danger with more joy

Than softer natures listen to the voice

Of pleasure; who with unremitting toil
In chase, in battle, or athletic course,
To fierceness steel'd their native hardihood,
Who sunk in death as tranquil as in sleep,
And hemm'd by hostile myriads, never turn'd
To flight, but closer drew before their breasts
The massy buckler, firmer fix'd the foot,

Bit the writh'd lip, and where they struggled fell.
And yet the Muse shall raise no song of grief
For Sparta's children; she can pass unmov'd
Amidst her desolation, nor bewail
The blow that laid her prostrate in the dust.
For she remembers, that her laws were fram'd
To blast and not to cherish the young germ
Of feeling, to repress Affection's tear,
And crush each tender charity; she knows

That all her sons were deaf to Wisdom's voice,

Breathing the precepts of Philosophy,

And that the lyre of eloquence and song

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Sounded for them in vain. She reads appall'd
That with malignant rage they led the shock
Of mailed war amidst the sylvan scenes
Where Fancy dwelt, and blew with insult rude
The trump of Discord in the marble schools
Where Science gather'd her Athenian sons.
The Muse's harp is silent-Warriors sing

The dirge of those who sleep in Sparta's tombs.

They sleep-but still their spirit walks the earth;

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Their martial shouts are heard from Maina's rocks, 525

Where, still unconquer'd thousands rally round

The of Grecian Freedom. Hardy race,

spear

How wild the dauntless glances of your eye

Midst slav'ry's tears; how sweet your war-notes swell

Upon the ear, long us'd to slav'ry's moan!

Sparta's true progeny! whose daughters leave

The distaff for the sword, and in the march

Of war outstrip their husbands and their sires.
Swift rushing from his fount of mountain-rock
Alpheus murmurs; now in narrow bed,
With cliffs o'erarch'd, thro' dells of brownest shade
Imbower'd with lofty platanes; now more broad

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Expanding o'er luxuriant plains, where copse
And thicket cluster on his even banks;

Now plunging headlong thro' a dusky cave
He winds his subterraneous course, and thence
Emerging, dimples o'er his shoals of sand,
Thro' groves of oak and chesnut, crowding close
The green recesses of some peaceful vale.
Rolling thro' Pisa's plain he sinks engulph'd
Beneath the ocean's wave, and joyful seeks
His Arethusa on Sicilia's shores.

Mourn for Olympia-o'er her prostrate fanes
Tread lightly, and if e'er the wint'ry stream
Wash from its crumbling banks the bruised helm,
Or spear-head blunted in the shock of arms,
Guard them in rev'rence of the mighty dead.
Mourn for Olympia—the loud shouts that burst
Along her plain, when round the victor's brows
The olive-wreath was twin'd, no longer ring;
And the harp's strains, which from assembled Greece
Drew the soft tears of sympathy and joy,

Are silent as the chambers of the tomb.

Warm'd into life, and cherish'd by the breath

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Of popular applause, amidst these schools

The Arts put forth their tender shoots, and bloom'd

With more than mortal beauty. Sculpture's hand
Rounded the marble to a living form;

Painting suspended her heroic tales

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The charm of fancy, and, unskill'd himself
In art, admir'd the artist's magic pow'rs.
Thrice happy Britain, if such taste were thine;
But thou, enwrapp'd in airy dreams of pow'r,
Or grov'lling in the base pursuit of wealth,
Hear'st not the charmer's voice, or turn'st away
Thine eye from beauties which thou can'st not feel.
Yet the neglected Muse shall have her day
Of triumph, when thy long concerted plans

Of empire are forgotten; when the voice

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Which in thy senate now proclaims itself
The oracle of wisdom, is expos'd,

Futile and vain, and all the babbling swarm,
The insects of a day, that buzz amidst
Thy legislative domes are heard no more,
Then shall she burst the overwhelming cloud
Of ignorance, which now obscures her
ray,

And bear thy name to the remotest age.

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Here where Selinus winds his murm'ring stream, 590 Midst swelling hills with fir and olive rob'd, The Philosophic Warrior' sought repose; Here his life's day, long overcast with storms, Sunk tranquil to its eve amidst the groves Of Scilluns; here he found that happiness, Which in the busy world's tumultuous throng,

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In courts of monarchs, and in battle's din,

He sought in vain. His lowly dwelling rose

Within a valley, on a verdant lawn;

And as the sage beneath his aged vine

Sat 'midst his children, his delighted eye

Rang'd o'er a beauteous scene of wood and dale,

5 Xenophon.

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