| |
| ’TIS done—but yesterday a King! | |
| And arm’d with Kings to strive— | |
| And now thou art a nameless thing: | |
| So abject—yet alive! | |
| Is this the man of thousand thrones, | 5 |
| Who strew’d our earth with hostile bones, | |
| And can he thus survive? | |
| Since he, miscalled the Morning Star, | |
| Nor man nor fiend hath fallen so far. | |
| |
| Ill-minded man! why scourge thy kind | 10 |
| Who bow’d so low the knee? | |
| By gazing on thyself grown blind, | |
| Thou taught’st the rest to see. | |
| With might unquestion’d,—power to save,— | |
| Thine only gift hath been the grave, | 15 |
| To those that worshipp’d thee; | |
| Nor till thy fall could mortals guess | |
| Ambition’s less than littleness! | |
| |
| Thanks for that lesson—it will teach | |
| To after-warriors more | 20 |
| Than high Philosophy can preach, | |
| And vainly preach’d before. | |
| That spell upon the minds of men | |
| Breaks never to unite again, | |
| That led them to adore | 25 |
| Those Pagod things of sabre sway | |
| With fronts of brass, and feet of clay. | |
| |
| The triumph and the vanity, | |
| The rapture of the strife— | |
| The earthquake voice of Victory, | 30 |
| To thee the breath of life; | |
| The sword, the sceptre, and that sway | |
| Which man seem’d made but to obey, | |
| Wherewith renown was rife— | |
| All quell’d—Dark spirit! what must be | 35 |
| The madness of thy memory! | |
| |
| The Desolator desolate! | |
| The Victor overthrown! | |
| The Arbiter of others’ fate | |
| A Suppliant for his own! | 40 |
| Is it some yet imperial hope | |
| That with such change can calmly cope? | |
| Or dread of death alone? | |
| To die a prince—or live a slave— | |
| Thy choice is most ignobly brave! | 45 |
| |
| He who of old would rend the oak, | |
| Dream’d not of the rebound: | |
| Chain’d by the trunk he vainly broke— | |
| Alone—how look’d he round? | |
| Thou, in the sternness of thy strength, | 50 |
| An equal deed hast done at length, | |
| And darker fate hast found: | |
| He fell, the forest prowlers’ prey; | |
| But thou must eat thy heart away! | |
| |
| The Roman, 1 when his burning heart | 55 |
| Was slaked with blood of Rome, | |
| Threw down the dagger—dared depart, | |
| In savage grandeur, home— | |
| He dared depart in utter scorn | |
| Of men that such a yoke had borne, | 60 |
| Yet left him such a doom! | |
| His only glory was that hour | |
| Of self-upheld abandon’d power. | |
| |
| The Spaniard, 2 when the lust of sway | |
| Had lost its quickening spell, | 65 |
| Cast crowns for rosaries away, | |
| An empire for a cell; | |
| A strict accountant of his beads, | |
| A subtle disputant on creeds, | |
| His dotage trifled well: | 70 |
| Yet better had he neither known | |
| A bigot’s shrine, nor despot’s throne. | |
| |
| But thou—from thy reluctant hand | |
| The thunderbolt is wrung— | |
| Too late thou leav’st the high command | 75 |
| To which thy weakness clung; | |
| All Evil Spirit as thou art, | |
| It is enough to grieve the heart | |
| To see thine own unstrung; | |
| To think that God’s fair world hath been | 80 |
| The footstool of a thing so mean; | |
| |
| And Earth hath spilt her blood for him, | |
| Who thus can hoard his own! | |
| And Monarchs bow’d the trembling limb, | |
| And thank’d him for a throne! | 85 |
| Fair Freedom! we may hold thee dear, | |
| When thus thy mightiest foes their fear | |
| In humblest guise have shown. | |
| Oh, ne’er may tyrant leave behind | |
| A brighter name to lure mankind! | 90 |
| |
| Thine evil deeds are writ in gore, | |
| Nor written thus in vain— | |
| Thy triumphs tell of fame no more, | |
| Or deepen every stain: | |
| If thou hadst died as honour dies, | 95 |
| Some new Napoleon might arise, | |
| To shame the world again— | |
| But who would soar the solar height, | |
| To set in such a starless night? | |
| |
| Weigh’d in the balance, hero dust | 100 |
| 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, | 105 |
| To dazzle and dismay: | |
| Nor deem’d Contempt could thus make mirth | |
| Of these, the Conquerors of the earth. | |
| |
| And she, proud Austria’s mournful flower, | |
| Thy still imperial bride; | 110 |
| 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? | 115 |
| If still she loves thee, hoard that gem,— | |
| ’Tis worth thy vanish’d diadem! | |
| |
| Then haste thee to thy sullen Isle, | |
| And gaze upon the sea; | |
| That element may meet thy smile— | 120 |
| It ne’er was ruled by thee! | |
| Or trace with thine all idle hand | |
| In loitering mood upon the sand, | |
| That Earth is now as free! | |
| That Corinth’s pedagogue hath now | 125 |
| Transferr’d his by-word to thy brow. | |
| |
| Thou Timour! in his captive’s cage 3 | |
| What thoughts will there be thine, | |
| While brooding in thy prison’d rage? | |
| But one—‘The world was mine!’ | 130 |
| Unless, like he of Babylon, | |
| All sense is with thy sceptre gone, 4 | |
| Life will not long confine | |
| That spirit pour’d so widely forth— | |
| So long obey’d—so little worth! | 135 |
| |
| Or, like the thief of fire from heaven, | |
| Wilt thou withstand the shock? | |
| And share with him, the unforgiven, | |
| His vulture and his rock! | |
| Foredoom’d by God—by man accurst, | 140 |
| And that last act, though not thy worst, | |
| The very Fiend’s arch mock; | |
| He in his fall preserved his pride | |
| And, if a mortal, had as proudly died! | |
| |
| There was a day—there was an hour, | 145 |
| While earth was Gaul’s—Gaul thine— | |
| When that immeasurable power | |
| Unsated to resign, | |
| Had been an act of purer fame | |
| Than gathers round Marengo’s name, | 150 |
| And gilded thy decline | |
| Through the long twilight of all time, | |
| Despite some passing clouds of crime. | |
| |
| But thou forsooth must be a king, | |
| And don the purple vest, | 155 |
| As if that foolish robe could wring | |
| Rememberance from thy breast. | |
| Where is that faded garment? where | |
| The gewgaws thou wert fond to wear, | |
| The star—the string—the crest? | 160 |
| Vain froward child of empire! say, | |
| Are all thy playthings snatched away? | |
| |
| Where may the wearied eye repose | |
| When gazing on the Great; | |
| Where neither guilty glory glows, | 165 |
| Nor despicable state? | |
| Yes—one—the first—the last—the best— | |
| The Cincinnatus of the West, | |
| Whom envy dared not hate, | |
| Bequeath’d the name of Washington, | 170 |
| To make man blush there was but one! | |
