Ye powers that rule the skies,
Memory recalls our great, our happy fate,Our well-appointed state,
The scenes of glory opening to our eyes,
When this vast empire o'er
The good Darius, with each virtue bless'dThat forms a monarch's breast,
Shielding his subjects with a father's careInvincible in war,
Extended like a god his awful power,
Then spread our arms their glory wide,
Guarding to peace her golden reign:
Each tower'd city saw with pride
Safe from the toils of war her homeward-marching train.
antistrophe 1
Nor Haly's shallow strand
He pass'd, nor from his palace moved his state;He spoke; his word was Fate.
What strong-based cities could his might withstand?
Not those that lift their heads
Where to the sea the floods of Strymon pass,Leaving the huts of Thrace;
Nor those, that far the extended ocean o'erStand girt with many a tower;
Nor where the Hellespont his broad wave spreads;Nor the firm bastions' rampired might,Whose foot the deep Propontis laves;
Nor those, that glorying in their height
Frown o'er the Pontic sea, and shade his darken'd waves.
strophe 2
Each sea-girt isle around
Bow'd to this monarch: humbled Lesbos bow'd;Paros, of its marble proud;
Naxos with vines, with olives Samos crown'd:
Him Myconos adored;
Chios, the seat of beauty; Andros steep,
That stretches o'er the deep
To meet the wat'ry Tenos; him each bay
Bound by the Icarian sea,
Him Melos, Gnidus, Rhodes confess'd their lord;O'er Cyprus stretch'd his sceptred hand:
Paphos and Solos own'd his power,
And Salamis, whose hostile strand,
The cause of all our wo, is red with Persian gore.
antistrophe 2
Ev'n the proud towns, that rear'd
Sublime along the lonian coast their towers,Where wealth her treasures pours,
Peopled from Greece, his prudent reign revered.
With such unconquer'd might
His hardy warriors shook the embattled fields,Heroes that Persia yields,And those from distant realms that took their way,And wedged in close arrayBeneath his glitt'ring banners claim'd the fight.
But now these glories are no more:
Farewell the big war's plumed pride:
The gods have crush'd this trophied power;Sunk are our vanquish'd arms beneath the indignant tide.
(XERXES enters, with a few followers. His royal raiment is torn,The entire closing scene is sung or chanted.)XERXESAh me, how sudden have the storms of Fate,Beyond all thought, all apprehension, burstOn my devoted head! O Fortune, Fortune!
With what relentless fury hath thy hand
Hurl'd desolation on the Persian race!
Wo unsupportable! The torturing thought
Of our lost youth comes rushing on my mind,And sinks me to the ground. O Jove, that
Had died with those brave men that died in fight ICHORUSO thou afflicted monarch, once the lord
Of marshall'd armies, of the lustre beam'dFrom glory's ray o'er Persia, of her sonsThe pride, the grace, whom ruin now hath sunkIn blood! The unpeopled land laments her youthBy Xerxes led to slaughter, till the realmsOf death are gorged with Persians; for the flowerOf all the realm, thousands, whose dreadful bowsWith arrowy shower annoy'd the foe, are fall'n.
XERXES
Your fall, heroic youths, distracts my soul.
CHORUS
And Asia sinking on her knee, O king,
Oppress'd, with griefs oppress'd, bends to the earth.
XERXES
And I, O wretched fortune, I was born
To crush, to desolate my ruin'd country!
CHORUS
I have no voice, no swelling harmony,
No descant, save these notes of wo,
Harsh, and responsive to the sullen sigh,Rude strains, that unmelodious flow,
To welcome thy return.
XERXES
Then bid them flow, bid the wild measures flowHollow, unmusical, the notes of grief;They suit my fortune, and dejected state.
CHORUS
Yes, at thy royal bidding shall the strainPour the deep sorrows of my soul;
The suff'rings of my bleeding country plain,And bid the mournful measures roll.
Again the voice of wild despair
With thrilling shrieks shall pierce the air;For high the god of war his flaming crestRaised, with the fleet of Greece surrounded,The haughty arms of Greece with conquest bless'd,And Persia's wither'd force confounded,Dash'd on the dreary beach her heroes slain,Or whelm'd them in the darken'd main.
XERXES
To swell thy griefs ask ev'ry circumstance.
CHORUS
Where are thy valiant friends, thy chieftains where?
Pharnaces, Susas, and the might
Of Pelagon, and Dotamas? The spear
Of Agabates bold in fight?