XII. Weighed in the balance, hero dust Is vile as vulgar clay; Thy scales, Mortality! are just To all that pass away; But yet methought, the living great Some higher sparks should animate, To dazzle and dismay; Nor deemed Contempt could thus make mirth Of these, the Conquerors of the earth. XIII. And she, proud Austria's mournful flower, Thy still imperial bride; How bears her breast the torturing hour? Still clings she to thy side? Must she too bend, must she too share Thy late repentance, long despair, Thou throneless Homicide? If still she loves thee, hoard that gem, 'Tis worth thy vanished diadem! XIV. Then haste thee to thy sullen Isle, And gaze upon the sea; That element may meet thy smile, Or trace with thine all idle hand, That Corinth's pedagogue hath now XV. Thou Timour! in his captive's cage 5 What thoughts will there be thine, While brooding in thy prisoned rage? But one-" The world was mine?" Unless, like he of Babylon, All sense is with thy sceptre gone, Life will not long confine That spirit poured so widely forthSo long obeyed-so little worth! XVI. Or like the thief of fire from heaven, Wilt thou withstand the shock? And share with him, the unforgiven, His vulture and his rock! 6 Foredoomed by God-by man accurst, And that last act, though not thy worst, The very Fiend's arch mock;7 He in his fall preserved his pride, And, if a mortal, had as proudly died! NOTES. Note 1, page 7, line 2. The rapture of the strife Certaminis guadia, the expression of Attila in his harangue to his army, previous to the battle of Chalons, given in Cassiodorus. Milo. Scylla. Charles V. Note 2, page 8, line 1. Note 3, page 8, line 10. The Roman, when his burning heart— Note 4, page 9, line 1. The Spaniard, when the lust of sway— Note 5, page 12, line 10. Thou Timour! in his captive's cage The cage of Bajazet, by order of Tamerlane. Note 6, page 13, line 1. Or like the thief of fire from heaven Prometheus. |