My strain, Minerva, blue-ey'd goddess, hear!
Endued with wisdom, but of heart severe;
Tritonian maid, arm'd with resistless power,
The wakeful guardian of the peopled tower,
Who from Jove's awful head sprung forth to light,
In golden panoply superbly dight;
And while the glittering spear thy hands essay'd,
Olympus trembled at the martial maid.
Affrighted Earth sounds from her deepest caves,
And swell of Ocean's tides the sable waves.—
The turgid billows sink—on heaven's high plains
His steeds the son of Hyperion reins,
Till Pallas lays her arms divine aside,
While Jove, his daughter views with conscious pride.
Daughter of Ægis-bearing Jove, farewell!
Soon shall a nobler strain thy actions tell.