And render the believers in our " Articles sensible,

How many must combine to form one Incomprehensible ! '

[LOVE AND GOLD]

[First published in the Edition of 1900 from a manuscript in the possession of Mr. Murray ] I CANNOT talk of Love to thee,

Though thou art young and free and fair! There is a spell thou dost not see,

That bids a genuine love despair.

And yet that spell invites each youth,
For thee to sigh, or seem to sigh;
Makes falsehood wear the garb of truth,
And Truth itself appear a lie.

If ever Doubt a place possest

In woman's heart, 't were wise in thine: Admit not Love into thy breast,

Doubt others' love, nor trust in mine.

Perchance 't is feign'd, perchance sincere,
But false or true thou canst not tell;
So much hast thou from all to fear,
In that unconquerable spell.

Of all the herd that throng around,
Thy simpering or thy sighing train,
Come tell me who to thee is bound

By Love's or Plutus' heavier chain.

In some 't is Nature, some 't is Art
That bids them worship at thy shrine;
But thou deserv'st a better heart,

Than they or I can give for thine.

For thee, and such as thee, behold,

Is Fortune painted truly — blind! Who doom'd thee to be bought or sold, Has proved too bounteous to be kind. Each day some tempter's crafty suit Would woo thee to a loveless bed: I see thee to the altar's foot A decorated victim led.

Adieu, dear maid! I must not speak Whate'er my secret thoughts may be;

Of an Athanasian Trinity,

I dare not talk of Love to thee.

20

30

ODE TO NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE

Expende Annibalem :- - quot libras in duce summo Invenies? JUVENAL, Sat. x.

"The Emperor Nepos was acknowledged by the Senate, by the Italians, and by the Provincials of Gaul; his moral virtues, and military talents, were loudly celebrated; and those who derived any private benefit from his government announced in prophetic strains the restoration of public felicity. . . By this shameful abdication, he protracted his life a few years, in a very ambiguous state, between an Emperor and an Exile, till

- GIBBON'S Decline and Fall, vol. vi. p. 220.

[Byron, when publishing The Corsair, in January, 1814, announced an apparently quite serious resolution to withdraw, for some years at least, from poetry. His letters, of the February and March following, abound in repetitions of the same determination. On the morning of the ninth of April, he writes: 'No more rhyme for- - or rather from me. I have taken my leave of that stage, and henceforth will mountebank it no longer.' In the evening, a Gazette Extraordinary announced the abdication of Fontainebleau, and the poet violated his vows next morning, by composing this Ode, which he immediately published, though without his name. His diary says: April 10. To-day I have boxed one hourwritten an Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte copied it- eaten six biscuits - drunk four bottles of soda water, and redde away the rest of my time.']

it will teach

Thanks for that lesson -
To after-warriors more
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

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, 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

The madness of thy memory!

The Desolator desolate !

The Victor overthrown! The Arbiter of others' fate