AMYNTAS.
13
The certain havock of life's cruel winter.
No, Sylvia, this is not the dreadful time,
Nor this the evil of which I forewarn thee;
'Tis common, and 'tis therefore not so galling.
Can'st thou not recollect what sage Elpinus
Told, a few days ago, the fair Lycoris?———
Lycoris, who as deeply should imbibe
Soft passion from Elpinus' noble song
As he receives it from Lycoris' eye;
If mortals once could love by reason's laws.
Battus, and Thyrsis heard Elpinus tell it,
Both finished masters in the art of love.
He told it in Aurora's sacred cave,
Where, o’er the portal awfully is written,
“Be feet profane far from this hallowed place.”
He told us—and he said he had the truth
From the great bard, who sung of arms and love,
And dying left him his harmonious flute;
———That in the nether world there is a cave,
Gloomy and drear, where lazy Acheron
Sends forth sulphureous, pestilential vapour;
No, Sylvia, this is not the dreadful time,
Nor this the evil of which I forewarn thee;
'Tis common, and 'tis therefore not so galling.
Can'st thou not recollect what sage Elpinus
Told, a few days ago, the fair Lycoris?———
Lycoris, who as deeply should imbibe
Soft passion from Elpinus' noble song
As he receives it from Lycoris' eye;
If mortals once could love by reason's laws.
Battus, and Thyrsis heard Elpinus tell it,
Both finished masters in the art of love.
He told it in Aurora's sacred cave,
Where, o’er the portal awfully is written,
“Be feet profane far from this hallowed place.”
He told us—and he said he had the truth
From the great bard, who sung of arms and love,
And dying left him his harmonious flute;
———That in the nether world there is a cave,
Gloomy and drear, where lazy Acheron
Sends forth sulphureous, pestilential vapour;
And
