Que ma douleur feduite embrasse aveuglément,
Vous prenez fur mon ame un trop puissant empire:
Durant quelques momens fouffrez que je respire,
Et que je confidere, en l'etat où je fuis,

Et ce que je hazarde, & ce que je poursuis.
Quand je regarde Augufte au milieu de fa gloire,
Et que vous reprochez à ma trifte mémoire
Que par fa propre main mon pére massacré
Du trône où je le vois fait le premier degré :
Quand vous me prefentez cette fanglante image,
La caufe de ma haine, & l'effet de fa rage,
Je m'abandonne toute à vos ardens transports,
Et crois pour une mort lui devoir mille morts.
Au milieu toutefois d'une fureur fi jufte,
J'aime encor plus Cinna que je ne hais Augufte;
Et je fens refroidir ce bouillant mouvement,
Quand il faut pour le suivre exposer mon amant.
Oui, Cinna, contre moi moi-même je m'irrite,
Quand je fonge aux dangers où je te précipite.
Quoique pour me fervir tu n'apprehendes rien,
Te demander du fang, c'est exposer le tien.
D'une fi haute place on n'abat point de têtes,
Sans attirer fur foi mille & mille tempêtes;
L'iffue en eft douteufe, & le peril certain.
Un ami deloyal peut trahir ton deffein ;

L'ordre

L'ordre mal concerté, l'occafion mal prife,
Peuvent fur fon auteur renverser l'entreprise,
Tourner fur toi les coups dont tu le veux frapper
Dans fa ruine même il peut t'enveloper;

Et quoi qu'en ma faveur ton amour exécute,
Il te peut en tombant écraser sous fa chute,
Ah! ceffe de courir à ce mortel danger :
Te perdre en me vengeant ce n'eft pas me venger.
Un cœur eft trop cruel quand il trouve des charmes
Aux douceurs que corromt l'amertume des larmes ;
Et l'on doit mettre au rang des plus cuifans malheurs
La mort d'un ennemi qui coute tant de pleurs.

Mais peut-on en verfer alors qu'on venge un pere? Eft-il perte à ce prix qui ne semble légére ?

Et quand fon affaffin tombe fous notre effort,
Doit-on confiderer-ce que coûte fa mort?
Ceffez, vaines frayeurs, ceffez, lâches tendreffes,
De jetter dans mon cœur vos indignes faibleffes;
Et toi qui les produis par tes foins fuperflus,
Amour, fers mon devoir, & ne le combats plus.
Lui ceder c'eft ta gloire, & le vaincre tahonte;
Montre-toi genereux, fouffrant qu'il te furmonte.
Plus tu lui donneras, plus il te va donner,
Et ne triomphera que pour te couronner.

I do not pretend, as Mr. Voltaire does, to make the reader a judge of the stile of Corneille by my tranflation; he must allow for the want of verfification, and be content with the thoughts, the fentiments, the conceits of the original.

EMILIA.

Impatient defires of an illuftrious vengeance, to which the death of my father gave birth, impetuous children of my resentment, which my deluded forrow embraces too blindly, you affume too great an empire over my mind. Suffer me to breathe a moment, and let me confider the state I am in, what I hazard, and what I would attempt. When I behold Cæfar in the midst of glory, you (I suppose this means, you, the impetuous children of the impatient defires of an illustrious vengeance) reproach my melancholy memory that my father, massacred by his hand, was the first step to the throne on which I fee him. And when you present me that bloody image, the cause of my hatred, the effect of his rage,

abandon

I

abandon myself to your violent transports, and think that for one death I owe him a thousand deaths. In the midft of so just an indignation I still lové Cinna more than I hate Augustus; and I find this boiling anger cool, when to obey it I must hazard my lover. Yes, Cinna, against myself, myself am angry, when I think of the dangers into which I precipitate thee. Though to serve me thou feareft nothing, to ask thee for blood is to expose thine. One beats not down heads from fo high a place without drawing upon one's felf a thousand and a thousand ftorms; the iffue is doubtful, the peril is certain. The order ill concerted, the opportunity ill chosen, may on their author overturn the whole enterprize, turn on thee the blow thou wouldst ftrike, and even envelope thee in his ruin; and what thou executeft for my fake may crush thee in its fall. Ah! do not run into this danger. To ruin yourself in revenging me is not to revenge That heart is too cruel which finds a sweetness in that vengeance which is corrupted by the bitterness of forrow; and one should

me.

P

fhould put in the rank of the greatest miffortunes the death of an enemy which costs fo many tears. But can one shed tears when one revenges a father? Is there a loss which does not seem light at that price? And when his affaffin dies by our means, ought we to confider what his death cofts us? Cease vain fears, ceafe foolish tenderness to affect my heart with your unworthy weaknesses: and thou who produceft them by thy fuperfluous anxieties, O love, affift my duty, do not combat with it; to yield to it is thy glory, to vanquish it thy difgrace; fhew thyself generous, fuffer it to overcome thee. The more thou giveft to it, the more it will give thee, and will triumph only to crown thee." Such mighty nothings in so strange a ftile

Amaze th' unlearn'd, and make the learned fmile.

The fecond scene of Emilia, and Fulvia her friend, is not fo abfurd as the foliloquy; but the answer Emilia gives to Fulvia, who urges to her, that the benefits she has received from Augustus, and the credit fhe has with him should

mitigate