Cum lapidem hunc, magni Qui nunc jacet incola stagni, Vel pede equus tanget, Vel arator vomere franget, Sentiet aegra metus, Effundet patria fletus, Littoraque ut fluctu, Resonabunt oppida luctu: Nam foecunda rubri Serpent per prata colubri, Gramina vastantes, Flores fructusque vorantes. Omnia foedantes, Vitiantes, et spoliantes; Quanquam haud pugnaces, Ibunt per cuncta minaces, Fures absque timore, Et pingues absque labore. Horrida dementes Rapiet discordia gentes; Plurima tunc leges Mutabit, plurima reges Natio; conversa In rabiem tunc contremet ursa MARMOR NORFOLCIENSE Cynthia, tunc latis Florebunt lilia pratis; Nec fremere audebit Leo, sed violare timebit, Omnia consuetus Populari pascua lætus. Ante oculos natos Calceatos et cruciatos Jam feret ignavus, Vetitaque libidine pravus. En quoque quod mirum, Quod dicas denique dirum, Sanguinem equus sugit, Neque bellua victa remugit! These lines he carefully copied, accompanied, in his letter of July 19, with the following translation. TO POSTERITY. Whene'er this stone, now hid beneath the lake, The horse shall trample, or the plough shall break, Then, O my country! shalt thou groan distrest, Grief swell thine eyes, and terrour chill thy breast. Thy streets with violence of woe shall sound, Loud as the billows bursting on the ground. Then through thy fields shall scarlet reptiles stray, And rapine and pollution mark their way. Their hungry swarms the peaceful vale shall fright, Still fierce to threaten, still afraid to fight; The teeming year's whole product shall devour, Insatiate pluck the fruit, and crop the flow'r; Shall glutton on the industrious peasants' spoil, Rob without fear, and fatten without toil; Then o'er the world shall discord stretch her wings; Kings change their laws, and kingdoms change their kings. The bear, enrag'd, th' affrighted moon shall dread; The lilies o'er the vales triumphant spread; Nor shall the lion, wont of old to reign Despotick o'er the desolated plain, Henceforth th' inviolable bloom invade, Or dare to murmur in the flow'ry glade; His tortur'd sons shall die before his face, While he lies melting in a lewd embrace; And, yet more strange! his veins a horse shall drain, Nor shall the passive coward once complain. I make not the least doubt, but that this learned person has given us, as an antiquary, a true and uncontrovertible representation of the writer's meaning; and, am sure, he can confirm it by innumerable quotations from the authors of the middle age, should he be publickly called upon by any man of eminent rank in the republick of letters; nor will he deny the world that satisfaction, provided the animadverter proceeds with that sobriety and modesty, with which it becomes every learned man to treat a subject of such importance.