Upon The Same Event

WHEN, far and wide, swift as the beams of morn The tidings past of servitude repealed, And of that joy which shook the Isthmian Field, The rough Aetolians smiled with bitter scorn. ''Tis known,' cried they, 'that he, who would adorn His envied temples with the Isthmian crown, Must either win, through effort of his own, The prize, or be content to see it worn By more deserving brows.--Yet so ye prop, Sons of the brave who fought at Marathon, Your feeble spirits! Greece her head hath bowed, As if the wreath of liberty thereon Would fix itself as smoothly as a cloud, Which, at Jove's will, descends on Pelion's top.'