Page:The Poetical Works of William Collins (1830).djvu/105

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ODES.

 

ODE TO PITY.

O thou, the friend of man, assign'd
With balmy hands his wounds to bind,
And charm his frantic woe:
When first Distress, with dagger keen,
Broke forth to waste his destined scene, 5
His wild unsated foe!

By Pella's^[1] bard, a magic name,
By all the griefs his thought could frame,
Receive my humble rite:
Long, Pity, let the nations view 10
The sky-worn robes of tenderest blue,
And eyes of dewy light!

1. Euripides, of whom Aristotle pronounces, on a comparison of him with Sophocles, that he was the greater master of the tender passions, ἦν τραγικώτερος.