A Hymn to Pallas
Pallas-Minerva’s deity, the renown’d,
My Muse in her variety must resound;
Mighty in councils; whose illustrous eyes
In all resemblance represent the skies.
A reverend maid of an inflexible mind;
In spirit and person strong; of triple kind;
Fautress of cities that just laws maintain;
Of Jove, the-great-in-councils, very brain
Took prime existence, his unbounded brows
Could not contain her, such impetuous throes
Her birth gave way to, that abroad she flew,
And stood, in gold arm’d, in her Father’s view,
Shaking her sharp lance. All Olympus shook
So terribly beneath her, that it took
Up in amazes all the Deities there.
All earth resounded with vociferous fear.
The sea was put up all in purple waves,
And settled suddenly her rudest raves.
Hyperion’s radiant son his swift-hov’d steeds
A mighty time stay’d, till her arming weeds,
As glorious as the Gods’, the blue-ey’d Maid
Took from her deathless shoulders; but then stay’d
All these distempers, and heaven’s counsellor, Jove,
Rejoic’d that all things else his stay could move.
So I salute thee still; and still in praise
Thy fame, and others’, shall my memory raise.