Page:The Art of Preserving Health - A Poem in Four Books.djvu/83

B. III. Forbear! No other pestilence has driven Such myriads o'er th' irremeable deep. Why this so fatal, the sagacious muse Thro' nature's cunning labyrinths could trace: But there are secrets which who knows not now, Must, ere he reach them, climb the heapy Alps Of science; and devote seven years to toil. Besides, I would not stun your patient ears With what it little boots you to attain. He knows enough, the mariner, who knows Where lurk the shelves, and where the whirlpools boil, What signs portend the storm: To subtler minds He leaves to scan, from what mysterious cause Charybdis rages in th' Ionian wave; Whence those impetuous currents in the main, Which neither oar nor sail can stem; and why Rh