What tho' sage Prospero attend,
While you the cavern'd hill descend,
Tho', warn'd by him, with bended head
You shun the shelving roof, and tread
With cautious foot the rugged way,
While tapers strive to mimic day?
Tho' he with hundred gates and chains
The Daemons of the mine restrains,
To whom their parent, jealous earth,
To guard her hidden stores gave birth,
At which, while kindred furies sung,
With hideous joy pale Orcus rung;
Tho' boiling with vain rage they sit
Fix'd to the bottom of the pit,
While at his beck the spi'rits of air
With breath of heaven their taints repair;
Or if they seek superior skies,
Thro' ways assign'd by him they rise,
Troop after troop at day expire
In torments of perpetual fire;
Tho' he with fury-quelling charms
The whole infernal host disarms,
And summons to your guarded sides
A squadron of etherial guides,
You still, when we together view
The dreadful enterprize and you,
The public care and wonder go
Of all above and all below.