"What Passions in a Parent's Breast debate!"
— Pope, Alexander (1688-1744)
Author
Work Title
Date
1709
Metaphor
"What Passions in a Parent's Breast debate!"
Metaphor in Context
Jove view'd the Combate, whose Event foreseen,
He thus bespoke his Sister and Queen.
The Hour draws on; the Destinies ordain,
My God-like Son shall press the Phrygian Plain:
Already on the Verge of Death he stands,
His Life is ow'd to fierce Patroclus' Hands.
What Passions in a Parent's Breast debate!
Say, shall I snatch him from Impending Fate;
And send him safe to Lycia, distant far
From all the Dangers and Toils of War;
Or to his Doom my bravest Off-spring yield,
And fatten, with Celestial Blood, the Field?
(ll. 225-36, p. 66)
He thus bespoke his Sister and Queen.
The Hour draws on; the Destinies ordain,
My God-like Son shall press the Phrygian Plain:
Already on the Verge of Death he stands,
His Life is ow'd to fierce Patroclus' Hands.
What Passions in a Parent's Breast debate!
Say, shall I snatch him from Impending Fate;
And send him safe to Lycia, distant far
From all the Dangers and Toils of War;
Or to his Doom my bravest Off-spring yield,
And fatten, with Celestial Blood, the Field?
(ll. 225-36, p. 66)
Categories
Provenance
Reading
Citation
Pope, Alexander. The Poems of Alexander Pope. A One-Volume Edition of the Twickenham Text with Selected Annotations. Ed. John Butt. New Haven: Yale UP, 1963.
Date of Entry
12/15/2003
