Page:Ovid's Metamorphoses (Vol. 1) - tr Garth, Dryden, et. al. (1727).djvu/308

⁠In vain Physicians would bestow their Aid,
Vain all their Art, and useless all their Trade;
And they, ev'n they, who fleeting Life recall,
Feel the same Pow'rs, and undistinguish'd fall.
If any proves so daring to attend
His sick Companion, or his darling Friend,
Th' officious Wretch sucks in contagious Breath,
And with his Friend does sypathize in Death.
⁠And now the Care and Hopes of Life are past,
They please their Fancies, and indulge their Taste;
At Brooks and Streams, regardless of their Shame,
Each Sex, promiscuous, strives to quench their Flame;
Nor do they strive in vain to quench it there,
For Thirst, and Life at once extinguish'd are.
Thus in the Brooks the dying Bodies sink,
But heedless still the rash Survivors drink.
⁠So much uneasy Down the Wretches hate,
They fly their Beds to struggle with their Fate;
But if decaying Strength forbids to rise,
The Victim crawls and rouls, till on the Ground he lies.
Each shuns his Bed, as each wou'd shun his Tomb,
And thinks th' Infection only lodg'd at home.
⁠Here one, with fainting steps, does slowly creep
O'er Heaps of Dead, and straight augments a Heap;
Another, while his Strength and Tongue prevail'd,
Bewails his Friend, and falls himself bewail'd:
This with imploring Looks surveys the Skies,⁠$\scriptstyle {\left.{\begin{matrix}\ \\\\\ \ \end{matrix}}\right\}\,}$
The last dear Office of his closing Eyes,
But finds the Heav'ns implacable, and dies.
⁠What now, ah! what employ'd my troubled Mind?
But only Hopes my Subjects Fate to find.
What Place soe'er my weeping Eyes survey,
There in lamented Heaps the Vulgar lay;
As Acorns scatter when the Winds prevail,
Or mellow Fruit from shaken Branches fall.

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