“Sarpedon, what necessity or needless humour drave Thy form to these wars, which in heart I know thou dost abhor, A man not seen in deeds of arms, a Lycian counsellor? They lie that call thee son to Jove, since Jove bred none so late; The men of elder times were they, that his high pow’r begat, Such men as had Herculean force. My father Hercules Was Jove’s true issue; he was bold; his deeds did well express They sprung out of a lion’s heart. He whilome came to Troy, (For horse that Jupiter gave Tros, for Ganymed, his boy) With six ships only, and few men, and tore the city down, Left all her broad ways desolate, and made the horse his own. For thee, thy mind is ill dispos’d, thy body’s pow’rs are poor, And therefore are thy troops so weak; the soldier evermore Follows the temper of his chief; and thou pull’st down a side. But say thou art the son of Jove, and hast thy means supplied With forces fitting his descent, the pow’rs that I compel Shall throw thee hence, and make thy head run ope the gates of hell.” Jove’s Lycian issue answer’d him: “Tlepolemus, ’tis true Thy father holy Ilion in that sort overthrew; Th’ injustice of the king was cause, that, where thy father had Us’d good deservings to his state, he quitted him with bad. Hesione, the joy and grace of king Laomedon, Thy father rescu’d from a whale, and gave to Telamon In honour’d nuptials (Telamon, from whom your strongest Greek Boasts to have issu’d) and this grace might well expect the like; Yet he gave taunts for thanks, and kept, against his oath, his horse, And therefore both thy father’s strength, and justice, might enforce The wreak he took on Troy; but this and thy cause differ far. Sons seldom heir their fathers’ worths. Thou canst not make his war. What thou assum’st for him, is mine, to be on thee impos’d.” With this, he threw an ashen dart; and then Tlepolemus los’d Another from his glorious hand. Both at one instant flew, Both strook, both wounded. From his neck Sarpedon’s jav’lin drew The life blood of Tlepolemus; full in the midst it fell; And what he threaten’d, th’ other gave, that darkness, and that hell. Sarpedon’s left thigh took the lance; it pierc’d the solid bone, And with his raging head ran through; but Jove preserv’d his son. The dart yet vex’d him bitterly, which should have been pull’d out, But none consider’d then so much, so thick came on the rout, And fill’d each hand so full of cause to ply his own defence; ‘Twas held enough, both fall’n that both were nobly carried thence Ulysses knew th’ events of both, and took it much to heart That his friend’s enemy should ’scape; and in a twofold part His thoughts contended, if he should pursue Sarpedon’s life, Or take his friend’s wreak on his men. Fate did conclude this strife, By whom ’twas otherwise decreed than that Ulysses’ steel Should end Sarpedon. In this doubt Minerva took the wheel From fickle Chance, and made his mind resolve to right his friend With that blood he could surest draw.