XVI.
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iew then a monarch ripened for a throne.Alcides thus his race began,O'er infancy he swiftly ran;The future God at first was more than man:Dangers and toils, and Juno's hate,Even o'er his cradle lay in wait,And there he grappled first with fate;In his young hands the hissing snakes he prest,So early was the Deity confest;Thus, by degrees, he rose to Jove's imperial seat;Thus difficulties prove a soul legitimately great.Like his, our hero's infancy was tried;Betimes the furies did their snakes provide,And to his infant arms opposeHis father's rebels, and his brother's foes;The more opprest, the higher still he rose.Those were the preludes of his fate,That formed his manhood, to subdueThe hydra of the many-headed hissing crew.
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