ODE то NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE. 1. "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, Who strew'd our Earth with hostile bones, And can he thus survive? Since he, miscall'd the Morning Star, Nor man nor fiend hath fallen so far. 2. Ill-minded man! why scourge thy kind Who bow'd so low the knee? By gazing on thyself grown blind, With might unquestion'd,-power to save- Nor till thy fall could mortals guess Ambition's less than littleness! 3. Thanks for that lesson-it will teach 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. 4. The triumph, and the vanity, The rapture of the strife— (1) The earthquake voice of Victory, The sword, the sceptre, and that sway Which man seem'd made but to obey, All quell'd!-Dark Spirit! what must be 5. The Desolator desolate! The Victor overthrown! The Arbiter of others' fate A Suppliant for his own! 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! 6. He (2) 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 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! 7. The Roman, (3) when his burning heart 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, Yet left him such a doom! His only glory was that hour Of self-upheld abandon'd power. 8. The Spaniard, (4) when the lust of sway Had lost its quickening spell, Cast crowns for rosaries away, A strict accountant of his beads, A subtle disputant on creeds, Yet better had he neither known A bigot's shrine, nor despot's throne. 9. But thou-from thy reluctant hand The thunderbolt is wrung Too late thou leav'st the high command 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 The footstool of a thing so mean; |