Orphic Proem

To Musæus

Learn, O Musæus, from my sacred song What rites most fit to sacrifice belong. Jove I invoke, the earth, and solar light, The moon’s pure splendour, and the stars of night. Thee, Neptune, ruler of the sea profound, Dark-hair’d, whose power can shake the solid ground; Ceres abundant, and of lovely mien, And thee, chaste Proserpine, great Pluto’s queen; The huntress Dian, and bright Phœbus’ rays, Far darting God, the theme of Delphic praise; And Bacchus, honour’d by the heav’nly choir, Impetuous Mars, and Vulcan, God of fire. Th’ illustrious power who sprung from foam to light, And Pluto, potent in the realms of night; With Hebe Young, and Hercules the strong, And you to whom the cares of births belong. Justice and Piety august I call, And much fam’d Nymphs, and Pan the God of all. To Juno sacred, and to Mem’ry fair, And the chaste Muses I address my pray’r; The various Year, the Graces, and the Hours, Fair-hair’d Latona, and Dione’s pow’rs. The Corybantes and Curetes armed I call, And the great Saviours, sons of Jove, the king of all: Th’ Idæan Gods, the angel of the skies, Prophetic Themis with sagacious eyes, With ancient Night, and Daylight I implore, And Faith and Dice source of blameless laws adore; Saturn and Rhea, and great Thetis too, Hid in a veil of dark celestial blue. I call great Ocean, and the beauteous train Of Ocean’s daughters in the boundless main: The strength of Atlas ever in its prime, Vig’rous Eternity, and endless Time. The splendid Stygian pool, and placid Gods beside, And dæmons good and bad that o’er mankind preside; Illustrious Providence, the noble train Of dæmon forms, who fill th’ etherial plain: Or live in air, in water, earth, or fire, Or deep beneath the solid ground retire. The white Leucothea of the sea I call, And Semele, and Bacchus’s associates all; Palæmon bounteous, and Adrastia great, And sweet-tongu’d Victory, with success elate; Great Esculapius, skill’d to cure disease, And dread Minerva, whom fierce battles please; Thunders, and Winds in mighty columns pent, With dreadful roaring struggling hard for vent; Attis, the mother of the pow’rs on high, Mensis, and pure Adonis, never doom’d to die, End and Beginning (greatest this to all), These with propitious aid suppliant call, To this libation, and these sacred rites; For these t’accede with joyful mind, my verse invites.