The Deification of Julius Cæsar.
But Æsculapius was a foreign Power:
In his own City Cæsar we adore:
Him Arms, and Arts alike renown'd beheld,
In Peace conspicuous, dreadful in the Field;
His rapid Conquests, and swift-finish'd Wars,
The Hero justly fix'd among the Stars;
Yet is his Progeny his greatest Fame:
The Son immortal makes the Father's Name.
The Sea-girt Britons, by his Courage tam'd,
For their high rocky Cliffs, and Fierceness fam'd;
His dreadful Navies, which victorious rode
O'er Nile's affrighted Waves and seven-sourc'd Flood;
Numidia, and the spacious Realms regain'd;
Where Cinyphis or flows, or Juba reign'd;
The Powers of titled Mithridates broke,
And Pontus added to the Roman Yoke;
Triumphal Shows decreed, for Conquests won,
For Conquests, which the Triumphs still outshone;
These are great Deeds; yet less, than to have giv'n
The World a Lord, in whom, propitious Heav'n,
When you decreed the Sov'reign Rule to place,
You blest with lavish Bounty human Race.
Now lest so great a Prince might seem to rise
Of mortal Stem, his Sire must reach the Skies;
The beauteous Goddess, that Æneas bore;
Foresaw it, and foreseeing did deplore;
For well she knew, her Hero's Fate was nigh,
Devoted by conspiring Arms to die.
Trembling, and pale, to every God, she cry'd,
Behold, what deep and subtle Arts are try'd,
To end the last, the only Branch that springs
From my Iulus, and the Dardan Kings!
