The Hymns of Callimachus, Translated from the Greek into English Verse, With Explanatory Notes To which are added, Select Epigrams, and the Coma Berenices of the same Author, Six Hymns of Orpheus, and The Encomium of Ptolemy by Theocritus. By William Dodd |
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 | The Hymns of Callimachus, Translated from the Greek into English Verse, With Explanatory Notes |  |
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III. The 33d HYMN.
To Apollo.
Blest Pæan come, Lycorian Phoebus, foe
Of daring Tityus, honour'd Memphian God,
Giver of health, of riches: golden-lyr'd;
From thee the seed, the field its rich encrease
Receives prolific, Grunian, Smynthian, bane
Of deadly Python, hallow'd Delphian prophet,
Rural, light-bearer, lovely noble youth:
Head of the Muses, leader of the choir,
Far-darting God, with bow and quiver arm'd,
Bacchian and twofold, whose dread pow'r extends
Afar, diffused wide; whose course oblique
Is shap'd; pure; Delian king, whose lucid eye
Light-giving all things views: whose locks are gold,
Who oracles and words of omen good
Revealest. Hear me with benignant mind
Entreating for the people: for thou view'st
This boundless æther all, this plenteous earth,
And ev'n beneath thro' the dark womb of things,
In night's still, gloomy regions, and beyond
Th'impenetrable darkness set with stars.
The fix'd foundations thou hast lay'd beneath,
And the whole world's extremities are thine.
Thyself for ever flourishing, to thee
Of things the rise and the decay belong,
The end and the beginning. With thy harp
Of various modulation thou the whole
Of nature harmonisest: the lowest string
Now sweetly touching, now in Dorian measure
Ascending to the highest: nature's tribes,
No less than nature, to thy harmony
Owe the variety and pleasing change
Of seasons; mix'd by thee in equal parts,
Summer and winter; on the highest string
This modulated, that the lowest claims,
While to a Dorian measure the sweet prime
Of lovely spring advances: mortals hence
Have call'd thee royal Pan, two-horned God,
The vivifying gales, thro' syrinx fam'd
Emitting: wherefore thou the marking seal
Of the whole world possessest. Hear blest pow'r,
And with propitious voice thy mystics save.
Of daring Tityus, honour'd Memphian God,
Giver of health, of riches: golden-lyr'd;
From thee the seed, the field its rich encrease
Receives prolific, Grunian, Smynthian, bane
Of deadly Python, hallow'd Delphian prophet,
Rural, light-bearer, lovely noble youth:
Head of the Muses, leader of the choir,
Far-darting God, with bow and quiver arm'd,
Bacchian and twofold, whose dread pow'r extends
Afar, diffused wide; whose course oblique
Is shap'd; pure; Delian king, whose lucid eye
Light-giving all things views: whose locks are gold,
Who oracles and words of omen good
Revealest. Hear me with benignant mind
Entreating for the people: for thou view'st
This boundless æther all, this plenteous earth,
And ev'n beneath thro' the dark womb of things,
In night's still, gloomy regions, and beyond
203
The fix'd foundations thou hast lay'd beneath,
And the whole world's extremities are thine.
Thyself for ever flourishing, to thee
Of things the rise and the decay belong,
The end and the beginning. With thy harp
Of various modulation thou the whole
Of nature harmonisest: the lowest string
Now sweetly touching, now in Dorian measure
Ascending to the highest: nature's tribes,
No less than nature, to thy harmony
Owe the variety and pleasing change
Of seasons; mix'd by thee in equal parts,
Summer and winter; on the highest string
This modulated, that the lowest claims,
While to a Dorian measure the sweet prime
Of lovely spring advances: mortals hence
Have call'd thee royal Pan, two-horned God,
The vivifying gales, thro' syrinx fam'd
Emitting: wherefore thou the marking seal
Of the whole world possessest. Hear blest pow'r,
And with propitious voice thy mystics save.
| The Hymns of Callimachus, Translated from the Greek into English Verse, With Explanatory Notes | |