XXXVIII. Oh, more or less than man - - in high or low, Battling with nations, flying from the field; However deeply in men's spirits skill'd, Look through thine own, nor curb the lust of war Nor learn that tempted Fate will leave the loftiest star XXXIX. Yet well thy soul hath brook'd the turning tide Which, be it wisdom, coldness, or deep pride, When the whole host of hatred stood hard by, To watch and mock thee shrinking, thou hast smiled With a sedate and all- enduring eye; When Fortune fled her spoil'd and favourite child, He stood unbowed beneath the ills upon him piled. XL. Sager than in thy fortunes; for in them And spurn the instruments thou wert to use XLI. If, like a tower upon a headlong rock, Thou hadst been made to stand or fall alone, Their admiration thy best weapon shone; For sceptred cynics earth were far too wide a den. 9 XLII. But quiet to quick bosoms is a hell, And there hath been thy bane; there is a fire XLIII. This makes the madmen who have made men mad By their contagion; Conqerors and Kings, Founders of sects and systems, to whom add Sophists, Bards, Statesmen, all unquiet things Which stir too strongly the soul's secret springs, And are themselves the fools to those they fool; Envied, yet how unenviable! what stings Are theirs! One breast laid open were a school Which would unteach mankind the lust to shine or rule: XLIV. Their breath is agitation, and their life A strom whereon they ride, to sink at last, And yet so nurs'd and bigotted to strife, That should their days, surviving perils past, Melt to calm twilight, they feel overcast With sorrow and supineness, and so die; Even as a flame unfed, which runs to waste With its own flickering, or a sword laid by Which cats into itself, and rusts ingloriously. XLV. He who ascends to mountain-tops, shall find The loftiest peaks most wrapt in clouds and snow; Must look down on the hate of those below. And thus reward the toils which to those summits led. XLVI. Away with these! true Wisdom's world will be A blending of all beauties; streams and dells, And chiefless castles breathing stern farewells From gray but leafy walls, where Ruin greenlyd wells. XLVII. And there they stand, as stands a lofty mind, But they who fought are in a bloody shroud, |