XXIII.

But earth had deeper stains. Ethereal powers! Benignant seraphs! wont to leave the skies, And hold high converse, midst his native bowers, With the once glorious son of Paradise, Look’d ye from heaven in sadness! were your strains Of choral praise suspended in dismay, When the polluted shrine of Syria’s plains With clouds of incense dimm’d the blaze of day? Or did ye veil indignantly your eyes. While demons hail’d the pomp of human sacrifice?