Their ardour kindles all the Grecian powers; And now the stones descend in heavier showers. As when high Jove his sharp artillery forms, And opes his cloudy magazine of storms; In winter’s bleak uncomfortable reign, A snowy inundation hides the plain; He stills the winds, and bids the skies to sleep; Then pours the silent tempest thick and deep; And first the mountain-tops are cover’d o’er, Then the green fields, and then the sandy shore; Bent with the weight, the nodding woods are seen, And one bright waste hides all the works of men: The circling seas, alone absorbing all, Drink the dissolving fleeces as they fall: So from each side increased the stony rain, And the white ruin rises o’er the plain.