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58    POEMS OF

To join forever on the hills of light.
To thine embrace his joyful spirit moves,
To thee, the partner of his earthly loves;
He welcomes thee to pleasures more refined,
And better suited to the immortal mind.


GOLIATH OF GATH.
1 SAM. CHAP. 17th.

YE martial powers, and all ye tuneful Nine,
Inspire my song, and aid my high design.
The dreadful scenes and toils of war I write,
The ardent warriors and the fields of fight:
You best remember, and you best can sing
The acts of heroes to the vocal string:
Resume the lays with which your sacred lyre
Did then the poet and the sage inspire.

Now front to front the armies were displayed,
Here Israel ranged, and there the foes arrayed;
The hosts on two opposing mountains stood,
Thick as the foliage of the waving wood.
Between them an extensive valley lay,
O'er which the gleaming armor poured the day;
When, from the camp of the Philistine foes,
Dreadful to view, a mighty warrior rose;
In the dire deeds of bleeding battle skilled,


PHILLIS WHEATLEY.    59

The monster stalks, the terror of the field.
From Gath he sprung, Goliath was his name,
Of fierce deportment and gigantic frame:
A brazen helmet on his head was placed,
A coat of mail from his form terrific graced;
The greaves his legs, the targe his shoulders prest;
Dreadful in arms, high towering o'er the rest,
A spear he proudly waved, whose iron head,
Strange to relate, six hundred shekels weighed:
He strode along, and shook the ample field,
While Phœbus blazed refulgent on his shield.
Through Jacob's race a chilling horror ran,
When thus the huge, enormous chief began:

"Say, what the cause, that in this proud array,
"You set your battle in the face of day?
"One hero find in all your vaunting train,
"Then see who loses, and who wins the plain;
"For he who wins, in triumph may demand
"Perpetual service from the vanquished land:
"Your armies I defy, your force despise,
"By far inferior in Philistia's eyes:
"Produce a man and let us try the fight,
"Decide the contest, and the victor's right."

Thus challenged he: all Israel stood amazed,
And ev'ry chief in consternation gazed;
But Jesse's son, in youthful bloom appears,
And warlike courage far beyond his years:
He left the folds, he left the flow'ry meads
And soft recesses of the sylvan shades.
Now Israel's monarch and his troops arise,

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