5 I ask not, god of dreams, thy care
To banish Love's presentments fair:
Nor rosy cheek nor radiant eye
Can arm him with such strong command
That the young sorcerer's fatal hand
Should round my soul his pleasing fetters tie.
Nor yet the courtier's hope, the giving smile
(A lighter phantom, and a baser chain)
Did e'er in slumber my proud lyre beguile
To lend the pomp of thrones her ill-according strain.
6 But, Morpheus, on thy balmy wing
Such honourable visions bring,
As soothed great Milton's injured age,
When in prophetic dreams he saw
The race unborn with pious awe
Imbibe each virtue from his heavenly page:
Or such as Mead's benignant fancy knows
When health's deep treasures, by his art explored,
Have saved the infant from an orphan's woes,
Or to the trembling sire his age's hope restored.
[Footnote: 1: After Timoleon had delivered Syracuse from the tyranny
of Dionysius, the people on every important deliberation sent for him
into the public assembly, asked his advice, and voted according to it.
--_Plutarch_.]
ODE III.
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