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Show ( 108 ] Bow' d his bright locks, and, fated from his birth To change eternal, mingled with the earth;With darker horror !hook the confcious wood, Groan' d the fad gales,. and rivers bluili' d with blood;· On cyprefs-boughs the Loves their quivers hung, Their arrows fcatter' d, and their bows unfirung ; And BEAUTY's.Go·DDEss., bending o~er his bier., Breathed the foft figh, and pour' d the tender tear.- Admiring PRosERPINE through dufky glades 5. 8' 5. Led the fair phantotn to Elyfian £hades, 1nterpretatiom.. Some have fuppofed that it al1egorized the fummer and-winter folfiice · but this feems too obvious a fact to have needed an hieroglyphic emblem. Other.s hav; b~li eved it to reprefent the corn, which was fuppofcd to fleep in the earth during the wmter months, and to rife out of it in fummer. This does not accord with the climate of Egypt, where the harvefi foon follows the feed-time. It fe~ms more probabl~ to hava been a fiory explaining fome hieroglyphic figures re~ refenu~g the decon:~ofiuon and r.efufcitation of animal matter; a fublime and interefimg fubjet\:, and wh1ch feerns to have gi.ven origin to the dochine of tranfmigraf 0 which had probably its birth alfo from the hieroglyphic treafures of Egypt. It is 1 r~~ mar.k able that the cyprefs groves in the antient Greek writers , as m· The ocn· tus, were ded1cated to Venus; and afterwards became funeral emblems . Wh'1 c h was pro b a b1 y ~ccafi~ned by the Cyprefs being an accompaniment of Venus in the annual proceffions,' 111 w. .h ich fhe was fuppofed to lament over the funeral of Ad om·s ,. a ceremony w h'1 ch obtamed ov~r all the eafiern world from great antiquity, and is fuppofed to be referred· 'o by Ezekiel, who accufes the idolatrous woman of weeping for Tharntl).us. [ 109 1 Clad with new form, with :finer fenfe combined, And lit with purer Rame the ethereal mind. -Erewhile, emerging from infernal night, The bright Affurgent rifes into light,. Leaves the drear chambers of the infatiate tomb, And .fhines and charms with renovated bloom.While wondering Loves the burfting grave f urround, And edge with meeting wings the yawning ground, Stretch their fair necks, and leaning o'er the brink 595· View the paie regions o~ the d·ead~ and .fhrink ; Long ·with broad eyes ecfratic-BE.A UTY fiands, Heaves her white bofom~ fpreads her waxen hands; Then with loud fhriek the panting Youth alarms, ''My Life! my Love!'' and fprings into his arms.'' 6oo The G~DDESS ceafed~,-the delegated throng- 0' er the wide plains delighted ruih along ; In duiky fquadrons, and in fhining groups, Hofis follow hofl:s, and troops fucceed to troops |
