Michael! to what thou wert, if I could raise
An aspiration, or a holy light,
Within one reader, I’d essay to praise
Thy virtue; and would supplicate the muse
For flowers to deck thy greatness: so I might
But urge one youthful artist on to choose
A life like thine, I would attempt the hill
Where well inspiring floods, and thence would drink
Till--as the Pythoness of old, the will
No longer then controll’d by sense--I’d think
Alone of good and thee, and with loud cries,
Break the dead slumber of undeeming man,
Refresh him with a gush of truth, surprise
Him with thy deeds, and show him thine was Wisdom’s plan.
[Illustration: ~Pisces.~]
This zodiacal sign is said to symbolize the fishery of the Nile, which
usually commenced at this season of the year. According to an ancient
fable, it represents Venus and Cupid, who, to avoid Typhon, a dreadful
giant with a hundred heads, transformed themselves into fish. This
fabulous monster, it seems, threw the whole host of heathen deities into
confusion. His story shortly is, that as soon as he was born, he began
to avenge the death of his brethren, the giants who had warred against
Olympus, by resuming the conflict alone. Flames of fire darted from his
eyes and mouths; he uttered horrid yells, and so frightened the pagan
celestials, that Jupiter himself became a ram, Juno a cow, Mercury an
ibis, Apollo a crow, Bacchus a goat, Diana a cat, Venus a fish, &c. till
Jupiter hurled a rock and buried him under Ætna. The idol Dagon, with a
human head and arms, and a fish’s tail, is affirmed to be the symbol of
the sun in Pisces, and to allegorize that the earth teems with corn and
fruits.
The sun generally enters Pisces about the period of February; for
instance, in 1824 on the 16th, in 1825 on the 18th of the month. The
Romans imagined that the entrance of the sun into Pisces was attended by
bad weather, and gales of uncertainty to the mariner.[1] Thomson sings,
that in this month--
Muttering, the winds at eve, with blunted point,
Blow hollow-blustering from the south. Subdued,
The frost resolves into a trickling thaw,
Spotted, the mountains shine; loose sleet descends,
And floods the country round. The rivers swell,
Of bonds impatient. Sudden from the hills,
O’er rocks and woods, in broad, brown cataracts,
A thousand snow-fed torrents shoot at once;
And where they rush, the wide resounding plain
Is left one slimy waste.
_Thomson._
[1] Dr. Forster’s Perenn. Cal.
~February 18.~
_St. Simeon_, Bp. of Jerusalem, A. D. 116. _Sts. Leo and Paregorius_,
3d Cent.