Yet cease the ways of Providence to blame, And human faults with human grief confefs;
'Tis thou art chang'd, while Heaven is ftill the fame;
From thy ill councils date thy ill fuccefs.
Impartial Juftice holds her equal fcales,
Till stronger virtue does the weight incline:
If over thee thy glorious foe prevails,
He now defends the cause that once was thine.
Righteous the war, the champion shall subdue;
For Jove's great handmaid Power muft Jove's decrees: purfue.
Hark! the dire trumpets found their fhrill alarms! Auverquerque, branch'd from the renown'd Naffaus, Hoary in war, and bent beneath his arms,
His glorious fword with dauntless courage draws.
When anxious Britain mourn'd her parting lord,
And all of William that was mortal died;
The faithful hero had receiv'd this fword
From his expiring master's much-lov'd fide.
Oft' from its fatal ire has Louis flown,
Where'er great William led, or Maefe and Sambre run.
XII.
But brandish'd high, in an ill-omen'd hour
To thee, proud Gaul, behold thy jufteft fear,
The mafter-fword, difpofer of thy power:
'Tis that which Cæfar the British peer.
He took the gift: Nor ever will I fheathe
This fteel (fo Anna's high behefts ordain),
The General faid, unless by glorious death
Abfolv'd, till conqueft has confirm'd your reign.
Returns like these our mistress bids us make,
When from a foreign prince a gift her Britons take.
XIII.
And now fierce Gallia rufhes on her foes,
Her force augmented by the Boyan bands;
So Volga's ftream, increas'd by mountain fnows,
Rolls with new fury down through Ruffia's lands.
Like two great rocks against the raging tide
(If Virtue's force with Nature's we compare),
Unmov'd the two united chiefs abide,
Suftain the impulfe, and receive the war.
Round their firm fides in vain the tempeft beats;
And ftill the foaming wave with lessen'd
The rage difpers'd, the glorious pair advance,
With mingled anger and collected might,
To turn the war, and tell aggreffing France,
How Britain's fons and Britain's friends can fight.
On conqueft fix'd, and covetous of fame,
Behold them rufhing through the Gallic hoft:
Through standing corn fo runs the sudden flame,
Or eastern winds along Sicilia's coast.
They deal their terrors to the adverse nation:
Pale death attends their arms, and ghastly defolation.
But while with fierceft ire Bellona glows,
And Europe rather hopes than fears her fate;
While Britain preffes her afflicted foes;
What horror damps the strong, and quells the great!
Whence look the foldiers' cheeks difmay'd and pale?
Erft ever dreadful, know they now to dread ?
The hoftile troops, I ween, almost prevail;
And the purfuers only not recede.
Alas! their leffen'd rage proclaims their grief!
For, anxious, lo! they crowd around their falling chief.
XVI.
I thank thee, Fate, exclaims the fierce Bavar;
Let Boya's trumpet grateful Iö's found :
I faw him fall, their thunderbolt of war :-
Ever to vengeance facred be the ground.—
Vain wifh fhort joy! the hero mounts again
In greater glory, and with fuller light:
The evening ftar fo falls into the main,
To rife at morn more prevalently bright.
He rises safe, but near, too near his fide,
A good man's grievous lofs, a faithful fervant died.
Propitious Mars! the battle is regain'd: The foe with leffen'd wrath disputes the field: The Briton fights, by favouring gods sustain’d : Freedom muft live; and lawless power must yield. Vain now the tales which fabling poets tell, That wavering Conqueft ftill defires to rove! In Marlborough's camp the goddefs knows to dwell: Long as the hero's life remains her love.
Again France flies, again the duke pursues,
And on Ramilia's plains he Blenheim's fame renews. XVIII.
Great thanks, O captain great in arms! receive
From thy triumphant country's public voice:
Thy country greater thanks can only give
To Anne, to her who made those arms her choice.
Recording Schellenberg's and Blenheim's toils,
We dreaded left thou should'ft those toils repeat:
We view'd the palace charg'd with Gallic fpoils,
And in those spoils we thought thy praise complete.
For never Greek we deem'd, nor Roman knight,
In characters like thefe did e'er his acts indite.
Yet, mindless still of eafe, thy virtue flies
A pitch to old and modern times unknown:
Thofe goodly deeds which we fo highly prize
Imperfect feem, great chief, to thee alone.
Those heights, where William's virtue might have staid,
And on the fubject world look'd fafely down,
By Marlborough pass'd, the props and steps were made
Sublimer yet to raise his queen's renown:
Still gaining more, ftill flighting what he gain'd, Nought done the hero deem'd while aught undone remain'd.
When fwift-wing'd Rumour told the mighty Gaul, How leffen'd from the field Bavar was fled; He wept the fwiftnefs of the champion's fall; And thus the royal treaty-breaker faid:
And lives he yet, the great, the loft Bavar,
Ruin to Gallia in the name of friend?
Tell me, how far has Fortune been severe ?
Has the foe's glory, or our grief, an end?
Remains there, of the fifty thousand loft,
To fave our threaten'd realm, or guard our shatter'd coaft?
To the clofe rock the frighted raven flies, Soon as the rifing eagle cuts the air: The fhaggy wolf unfeen and trembling lies, When the hoarse roar proclaims the lion near. Ill-ftarr'd did we our forts and lines forfake, To dare our British foes to open fight: Our conqueft we by ftratagem should make : Our triumph had been founded in our flight. 'Tis ours by craft and by furprise to gain : 'Tis theirs, to meet in arms, and battle in the plain. XXII.
The ancient father of this hoftile brood,
Their boafted Brute, undaunted fnatch'd his gods
From burning Troy, and Xanthus red with blood,
And fix'd on filver Thames his dire abodes:
And this be Troynovante, he faid, the feat
By Heaven ordain'd, my fons, your lasting place;
Superior here to all the bolts of fate
Live, mindful of the author of your race,
Whom neither Greece, nor war, nor want, nor flame, Nor great Pelides' arm, nor Juno's rage, could tame.
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