This the bright goddess, passionately moved, With envy saw, yet inwardly approved. The scene of heavenly guilt with haste she tore, Nor longer the affront with patience bore: A boxen shuttle in her hand she took, And more than once Arachne’s forehead struck. The unhappy maid, impatient of the wrong, Down from a beam her injured person hung; When Pallas, pitying her wretched state, At once prevented and pronounced her fate: “Live; but depend, vile wretch,” the goddess cried, “Doom’d in suspense for ever to be tied; That all your race, to utmost date of time, May feel the vengeance, and detest the crime.”