Out rush'd his son, complotter with his wife, His right hand grasp'd the long, the fatal knife, His left the channel of the seed of life, 281 Which from the roots the rough tooth'd metal tore, And bathed his fingers with his father's gore; He throw'd behind the source of Heaven's pain; Nor fell the ruins of the god in vain;

The sanguine drops which from the members fall, The fertile earth receives, and drinks them all. Hence, at the end of the revolving year,

Sprung mighty giants, powerful with the spear, Shining in arms; the Furies took their birth 290 Hence, and the Woodnymphs of the spacious Saturn the parts divided from the wound, [earth. Spoils of his parent god, cast from the ground Into the sea: long through the watery plain They journey'd on the surface of the main. Fruitful at length the' immortal substance grows, Whitening it foams, and in a circle flows; Behold a nymph arise divinely fair,

surges

bear;

Whom to Cythera first the
Hence is she borne, safe o'er the deeps profound,
To Cyprus, water'd by the waves around: 301
And here she walks endow'd with every grace
To charm, the goddess blooming in her face;
Her looks demand respect, and where she goes
Beneath her tender feet the herbage blows;
And Aphrodite, from the foam, her name,
Among the race of gods and men the same;
And Cytherea from Cythera came;

Whence, beauteous crown'd, she safely cross'd

the sea,

And call'd, O Cyprus, Cypria from thee; 310 Nor less by Philomedea known on earth,

A name derived immediate from her birth;

Her first attendants to the' immortal choir Were Love (the oldest god) and fair Desire: The virgin whisper, and the tempting smile, The sweet allurements that can hearts beguile, Soft blandishments which never fail to move, Friendship, and all the fond deceits in love, Constant her steps pursue, or will she go Among the gods above, or men below.

320

Great Heaven was wroth, thus by his sons to
bleed,

And call'd them Titans from the barbarous deed;
He told them all, from a prophetic mind,
The hours of his revenge were sure behind.

Now darksome Night fruitful begun to prove,
Without the knowledge of connubial love;
From her black womb sad Destiny and Fate,
Death, Sleep, and numerous Dreams, derive their

date:

330

With Momus the dark goddess teems again,
And Care, the mother of a doleful train;
The' Hesperides she bore, far in the seas,
Guards of the golden fruit, and fertile trees:
From the same parent sprung the rigorous three,
The goddesses of fate and destiny,

Clotho and Lachesis, whose boundless sway,
With Atropos, both men and gods obey;
To human race they, from their birth, ordain
A life of pleasure, or a life of pain;
To slavery or to empire, such their power,
They fix a mortal at his natal hour;
The crimes of men and gods the Fates pursue,
And give to each alike the vengeance due;
Nor can the greatest their resentment fly,
They punish ere they lay their anger by:

340

And Nemesis from the same fountain rose,
From hurtful Night, herself the source of woes :
Hence Fraud and loose Desire, the bane of life,
Old Age vexatious, and corroding Strife.

From Strife pernicious painful Labour rose, Oblivion, Famine, and tormenting Woes; 350 Hence combats, murders, wars, and slaughters, Deceits and quarrels, and injurious lies; [rise, Unruly license hence, that knows no bounds, And losses spring, and sad domestic wounds; Hence perjury, black perjury, began,

A crime destructive to the race of man.

Old Nereus to the Sea was born of Earth, Nereus who claims the precedence in birth To their descendants; him' old god' they call, Because sincere and affable to all;

360

In judgment moderation he preserves,
And never from the paths of justice swerves.
Thaumas the great from the same parents came,
Phorcys the strong, and Ceto beauteous dame :
To the same sire did Earth Eurybia bear,
As iron hard her heart, a cruel fair.

Doris to Nereus bore a lovely train,

369

Fifty fair daughters, wanderers of the main ;
A beauteous mother she, of Ocean born,
Whose graceful head the comeliest locks adorn :
Proto, Eucrate, nymphs begin the line,
Sao to whom, and Amphitrite, join;
Eudore, Thetis, and Galene, grace,
With Glauce, and Cymothoe, the race;
Swift-footed Spio hence derives her birth,
With thee, Thalia, ever prone to mirth;
And Melite, charming in mien to see,
Did the same mother bear Eulimene,
Agave too, Pasithea, and thee;