On the Statues at Catina

Behold, with hallow'd weight these Brothers bend! Eternal honour on their toil attend! Etna's fierce torrents pause as they retire, And back with rev'rence turns the wand'ring fire. Clasping their Parents on their shoulders plac'd, They raise their eyes, and through the ruin haste; Aloft the elders, in their offspring's guard, With dear incumbrance their quick steps retard. See, the sire points where conflagration falls, While on the Gods the trembling mother calls! Their hair starts up in terror! Through the brass An universal shudder seems to pass. A bolder horror in the youths is shewn, More firm, and fearing for their charge alone. Their vests blown back, his right hand one extends, Confiding that the left his sire defends: His load with twisted arms the other holds; So fonder care the weaker sex infolds. Nor unrewarded by discernment's praise Be this nice merit, that mute art displays; Fraternal likeness in the youths admire, Tho' one reflects his mother, one his sire. Thus skilful art makes different minds agree, And either Parent in each Child you see: Each Youth with pious love the sculptor warms, With new distinctions in resembling forms. O ye (to nature true, and heaven your guide, Light to the young, the elders' wish or pride,) Who rush'd thro' fire, and not from lucre's rage, But keen to save the sanctity of age! Enceladus, thy flame-diffusing jaws Such virtue silenc'd to a solemn pause: His flowing Etna Mulciber represt, Lest piety should lose so dear a test: The elements rever'd their faith—air, earth, Gave a parental aid to filial worth. If Spartan sons by love to heaven aspire; If Troy's Aeneas by his rescued sire; If youths of Argos shine a double star, The youths who fondly drew their mother's Car! Say why, Amphinomus, Anapius, why Does no just shrine forbid your fame to die? Tho' Sicily has many claims to praise, A nobler claim than yours she ne'er could raise. Let her not grieve, to conflagration doom'd, Nor mourn the fabrics in these flames consum'd; Virtue, without such proof, had lost her crown; Wide ruin was the price of infinite renown.