Classic Poem

I.

O H touch the String, celestial Muse, and say,
Why are peculiar Times and Seasons blest?
Is it in Fate, that one distinguish'd Day
Shou'd with more hallow'd Purple paint the East?

II.

Look on Life and Nature's Race!
How the careless Minutes pass,
How they wear a common Face:
One is what another was!
Till the happy Hero's Worth
Bid the Festival stand forth;
Till the golden Light he crown,
Till he mark it for his own.

III.

How had this glorious Morning been forgot,
Unthought of as the Things that never were;
Had not our greatest Caesar been its Lot,
And call'd it from amongst the vulgar Year.

IV.

Now, Nature, be gay
In the Pride of thy May ,
To Court let thy Graces repair:
Lot Flora bestow
The Crown from her Brow,
For our brighter Britannia to wear.

V.

Through ev'ry Language of thy peopled Earth,
Far as the Seas or Caesar 's Influence goes,
Let thankful Nations celebrate his Birth,
And bless the Author of the World's Repose,

VI.

Let Volga tumbling in Cascades ,
And Po that glides thro' poplar Shades,
And Tagus bright in Sands of Gold,
And Arethusa , Rivers old,
Their great Deliverer sing.
Not Danube thou whose winding Flood
So long has blush'd with Turkish Blood,
To Caesar shall refuse a Strain,
Since now thy Streams without a Stain
Run Crystal as their Spring.

CHORUS.

To mighty G EORGE , that heals thy Wounds,
That names thy Kings and marks thy Bounds,
The joyful Voice, O Europe , raise:
In the great Mediator's Praise
Let all thy various Tongues combine,
And Britain 's Festival be thine.