Page:Ovid's Metamorphoses (Vol. 2) - tr Garth, Dryden, et. al. (1727).djvu/191

Then must I lose these Arms, because I came
To fight uncall'd, a voluntary Name.
Nor shunn'd the Cause, but offer'd you my Aid,
While he long lurking was to War betray'd:
Forc'd to the Field he came, but in the Reer;
And feign'd Distraction to conceal his Fear:
Till one more cunning caught him in the Snare;
(Ill for himself) and dragg'd him into War.
Now let a Hero's Arms a Coward vest,
And he who shunn'd all Honours, gain the best:
And let me stand excluded from my Right,
Robb'd of my Kinsman's Arms, who first appear'd in Fight.
Better for us, at home had he remain'd,
Had it been true the Madness which he feign'd,
Or so believ'd; the less had been our Shame,
The less his counsell'd Crime, which brands the Grecian Name;
Nor Philoctetes had been left inclos'd
In a bare Isle, to Wants and Pains expos'd,
Where to the Rocks, with solitary Groans,
His Suff'rings, and our Baseness he bemoans:
And wishes (so may Heav'n his Wish fulfil)
The due Reward to him who caus'd his Ill.
Now he, with us to Troy's Destruction sworn,
Our Brother of the War, by whom are born
Alcides' Arrows, pent in narrow Bounds,
With Cold and Hunger pinch'd, and pain'd with Wounds,
To find him Food and Cloathing, must employ
Against the Birds the Shafts due to the Fate of Troy.
Yet still he lives, and lives from Treason free,
Because he left Ulysses' Company:
Poor Palamede might wish, so void of Aid,
Rather to have been left, than so to Death betray'd.
The Coward bore the Man immortal Spight,
Who sham'd him out of madness into Fight:
Nor daring otherwise to vent his Hate,
Accus'd him first of Treason to the State;

And