s I bear,
Hear your Hermaphrodite, and grant my prayer;
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Oh grant, that whomsoe'er these streams contain,
If man he entered, he may rise again
Supple, unsinewed, and but half a man!
The heavenly parents answered, from on high,
Their two-shaped son, the double votary;
Then gave a secret virtue to the flood,
And tinged its source to make his wishes good.
TO HER ROYAL HIGHNESS THE PRINCESS OF WALES,[12]
WITH THE TRAGEDY OF CATO, NOV. 1714.
The Muse that oft, with sacred raptures fired,
Has generous thoughts of liberty inspired,
And, boldly rising for Britannia's laws,
Engaged great Cato in her country's cause,
On you submissive waits, with hopes assured,
By whom the mighty blessing stands secured,
And all the glories that our age adorn,
Are promised to a people yet unborn.
No longer shall the widowed land bemoan
A broken lineage, and a doubtful throne;
_10
But boast her royal progeny's increase,
And count the pledges of her future peace.
O, born to strengthen and to grace our isle!
While you, fair Princess, in your offspring smile,
Supplying charms to the succeeding age,
Each heavenly daughter's triumphs we presage;
Already see the illustrious youths complain,
And pity monarchs doomed to sigh in vain.
Thou too, the darling of our fond desires,
Whom Albion, opening wide her arms, requires,
_20
With manly valour and attractive air
Shalt quell the fierce and captivate the fair.
O England's younger hope! in whom conspire
The mother's sweetness and the father's fire!
For thee perhaps, even now, of kingly race,
Some dawning beauty blooms in every grace,
Some Carolina, to heaven's dictates true,
Who, while the sceptred rivals vainly sue,
Thy inborn worth with conscious eyes shall see,
And slight the imperial diadem for thee.
_30
Pleased with the prospect of successive reigns,
The tuneful tribe no more in daring strains
Shall vindicate, with pious fears oppressed,
Endangered rights, and liberty distressed:
To milder sounds each Muse shall tune the lyre,
And gratitude, and faith to kings inspire,
And filial love; bid impious discord cease,
And soothe the madding factions into peace;
Or rise ambitious in more lofty lays,
And teach the nation their new monarch's praise,
_40
Describe his awful look and godlike mind,
And Caesar's power with Cato's virtue joined.
Meanwhile, bright Prince
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