Page:Prometheus Bound (Webster 1866).djvu/39

 Like to a bad physician fallen sick,

Despair and know no drug to heal thyself.

You'll marvel more when you have heard the rest;

What arts and what resources I contrived:

The greatest this—if any one fell ill

There was no help, neither of solid drugs

Of chrisms nor of draughts, but for the lack

Of medicine they wasted till I showed them

How to mix soothing remedies by which

They ward off all diseases. Many ways

Of divinations I arranged for them,

Interpreted what dreams must needs receive

Their due fulfilment, made them comprehend

The difficult sound omens, and of things

Met on a journey. And I carefully

Defined the flights of birds of prey—which kind

Showed good, which harm—what several ways of life,

What hatreds one to another, and what loves,

And gatherings together are their wont.

The smoothness of the liver I explained,

What colour it should be to please the gods,