Page:Tragedies of Seneca (1907) Miller.djvu/419

Rh Who finds that refuge, fears no more These nameless terrors, these assaults, These insolent assaults of fate, And sidelong-glancing bolts of Jove. Deep peace of death! No frenzied burgher-throng to fear, No victor's threatening madness here; No wild seas ruffled by the blast; No hosts in serried battle massed, Where whirling clouds of dust disclose The savage riders to their foes;

No nation falling with its city's fall, 'Mid smouldering battlement and crumbling wall; No wasting fires, No burning pyres, And all the horrors impious war inspires.

They from the servile bonds of fate This human life emancipate, Who fickle fortune dare to brave, And face the terrors of the grave; Who joyful view the joyless Styx, And dare their mortal span to fix.

How like a king, how like a god on high Is he who faces death nor fears to die! In one dark night we saw our city doomed, When Doric fires the Dardan homes consumed; But not in battle, not by warlike arts, As once it fell beneath Alcides' darts.

No son of Thetis dealt the blow Which wrought our final overthrow, Nor his loved friend, Patroclus hight, When once, in borrowed armor dight, Hi put our Trojan chiefs to flight; Nor when Pelides' self gave o'er The fierce resentment that he bore, And sped him forth on vengeance bent— Not even in such evils pent, Did Troy to cruel fortune bend, But struggled bravely to the end.