sæpius olim
Religio peperit scelerosa.—Lib. I. v. 83.
Yet Superstition has of old brought forth
More impious wickedness; witness that time
In Aulis, when at Dian’s temple met
Th’ associate Princes, Chiefs, the prime of Greece,
And stain’d her altar with the virgin blood
Of Iphigenia: o’er her youthful locks
They bound the fillets; on her cheeks she felt
The dress of sacrifice: but when she saw
Beside the altar her dear father stand
In sorrow, and for his sake the ministers
Hiding their knife, and all the assembly round
Weeping at sight of her; when this she saw,
Struck mute with terror, on her knees she sunk.
Ah! then in vain she called upon her king,
Her father, urged him by a parent’s love
To save his wretched child; while ruthless hands
Bore her all trembling to the altar’s base;
Not for her nuptials, not for holy rites
Of Hymen, tended on with dance and song;
But for a foul and bloody sacrifice.
So fell this chaste and tearful victim, slain
Ev’n in her marriage hour; and all to free
Their wind-bound Navy from the fancied let
Of adverse Deities, to such a guilt
Could Superstition prompt a father’s heart.