_Admetus sinks down on the threshold and buries his face in his robe. The Chorus gather up the feeling of the situation in a full Choral Ode, celebrating the natural topics of consolation; the stern laws of Necessity, the fair memory of the dead._ CHORAL INTERLUDE IV _Strophe I_ My venturous foot delights {1018} To tread the Muses' arduous heights; Their hallow'd haunts I love t' explore, And listen to their lore: Yet never could my searching mind Aught, like Necessity, resistless find. No herb of sovereign pow'r to save, Whose virtues Orpheus joy'd to trace, And wrote them in the rolls of Thrace; Nor all that Phoebus gave, Instructing the Asclepian train, When various ills the human frame assail, To heal the wound, to soothe the pain, 'Gainst Her stern force avail. _Antistrophe I_ Of all the Pow'rs Divine {1032} Alone none dares t' approach Her shrine; To Her no hallow'd image stands, No altar She commands. In vain the victim's blood would flow, She never deigns to hear the suppliant's vow. Never to me mayst Thou appear, Dread Goddess, with severer mien Than oft in life's past tranquil scene Thou hast been known to wear. By Thee Jove works his stern behest: Thy force subdues e'en Scythia's stubborn steel; Nor ever does Thy rugged breast The touch of pity feel. _Strophe II_ And now, with ruin pleas'd, {1046} On thee, O King, her hands have seiz'd, And bound thee in her iron chain: Yet her fell force sustain. For from the gloomy realms of night No tears recall the dead to life's sweet light. No virtue, though to heav'n allied, Saves from the inevitable doom: Heroes and sons of gods have died, And sunk into the tomb. Dear, whilst our eyes her presence blest, Dear, in the gloomy mansions of the dead: Most generous she, the noblest, best, Who graced thy nuptial bed. _Antistrophe II_ Thy wife's sepulchral mound {1060} Deem not as common, worthless ground That swells their breathless bodies o'er Who die, and no are more. No, be it honor'd as a shrine; Raised high, and hallow'd to some Pow'r Divine: The traveller, as he passes by, Shall thither bend his devious way, With reverence gaze, and with a sigh, Smite on his breast, and say: "She died of old to save her lord; Now blest among the blest; Hail, Pow'r revered, To us thy wonted grace afford!" Such vows shall be preferred. EXODUS, OR FINALE _Re-enter Hercules, leading a veiled woman_