On ir’n and solid brass, with mighty strength;

Which heav’n’s and earth’s concussions shall endure,

Maugre all shocks, eternal, and secure:

There, on perennial adamant design’d,

The various fortunes of your race you’ll find:

Well I have mark’d ’em, and will now relate

To thee the settled laws of future fate.

‘He, goddess, for whose death the fates you blame,

Has finish’d his determin’d course with fame:

To thee ’tis giv’n, at length that he shall shine

Among the gods, and grace the worshipp’d shrine:

His son to all his greatness shall be heir,

And worthily succeed to empire’s care:

Our self will lead his wars, resolv’d to aid

The brave avenger of his father’s shade:

To him its freedom Mutina shall owe,

And Decius his auspicious conduct know:

His dreadful pow’rs shall shake Pharsalia’s plain,

And drench in gore Philippi’s fields again:

A mighty leader in Sicilia’s flood,

Great Pompey’s warlike son shall be subdu’d.

Aegypt’s soft queen, adorn’d with fatal charms,

Shall mourn her soldier’s unsuccessful arms:

Too late shall find, her swelling hopes were vain,

And know, that Rome o’er Memphis still must reign:

Why name I Afric or Nile’s hidden head?

Far as both oceans roll, his pow’r shall spread:

All the known earth to him shall homage pay,

And the seas own his universal sway:

When cruel war no more disturbs mankind;

To civil studies shall he bend his mind,

With equal justice guardian laws ordain,

And, by his great example, vice restrain:

Where will his bounty or his goodness end?

To times unborn his gen’rous views extend;

The virtues of his heir our praise engage,

And promise blessings to the coming age:

Late shall he in his kindred orbs be plac’d,

With Pylian years, and crouded honours grac’d.

Meantime, your hero’s fleeting spirit bear,

Fresh from his wounds, and change it to a star:

So shall great Julius rites divine assume,

And from the skies eternal smile on Rome.’

This spoke; the goddess to the senate flew:

Where, her fair form conceal’d from mortal view,

Her Caesar’s heav’nly part she made her care,

Nor left the recent soul to waste to air,

But bore it upwards to its native skies:

Glowing with new-born fires she saw it rise;

Forth springing from her bosom up it flew,

And, kindling, as it soar’d, a comet grew;

Above the lunar sphere it took its flight,

And shot behind it a long trail of light.

Thus rais’d, his glorious offspring Julius view’d.

Beneficently great, and scatt’ring good,

Deeds, that his own surpass’d, with joy beheld,

And his large heart dilates to be excell’d.

What, though this prince refuses to receive

The preference, which his juster subjects give;

Fame uncontroll’d, that no restraint obeys,