e make my fount of Helicon.
By such a mount, such nymphs, such floods,
As Heaven did please, was I a poet born.
No king of any kingdom,
No favouring hand of emperor,
No highest priest nor great pastor,
Has given to me such graces, honours, privileges,
As are those laurel leaves with which
O'ershadowed are my heart, my thoughts, my tears.

Here he declares his mountain to be the exalted affection of his heart,
his Muses he calls the beauties and attributes of the object of his
affections, and the fountain is his tears. In that mountain affection is
kindled; through those beauties enthusiasm is conceived, and by those
tears the enthusiastic affection is demonstrated; and he esteems himself
not less grandly crowned by his heart, his thoughts, and his tears than
others are by the hand of kings, emperors, and popes.

CIC. Explain to me what he means by his heart being in form like
Parnassus.

TANS. Because the human heart has two summits, which terminate in one
base or root; and, spiritually, from one affection of the heart proceed
two opposites, love and hate; and the mountain of Parnassus has two
summits and one base.

CIC. On to the next!

3.

The captain calls his warriors to arms,
And at the trumpet's sound they all
Under one sign and standard come.
But yet for some in vain the call is heard,
Heedless and unprepared, they mind it not.
One foe he kills, and the insane unborn,
He banishes from out the camp in scorn.
And thus the soul, when foiled her high designs,
Would have all those opponents dead or gone;
One object only I regard,
One face alone my mind does fill,
One beauty keeps me fixed and still;
One arrow pierced my heart, and one
The fire with which alone I burn,
And towards one paradise I turn.

This captain is the human will, which dwells in the depths of the soul
with the small helm of reason to govern and guide the interior powers
against the wave of natural impulses. He, with the sound of the
trumpet--that is, by fixed resolve--calls all the warriors or invokes
all the powers; called warriors because they are in continual strife and
opposition; and their affections, which are all contrary thoughts, some
towards one and some towards the other side inclining, and he tries to
bring them all under one flag--one settled end and aim. Some are called
in vain to put in a ready appearance, and are chiefly thos