Don Juan quotes

I want a hero: an uncommon want, When every year and month sends forth a new one,

Till, after cloying the gazettes with cant, The age discovers he is not the true one;

His father’s name was José—Don, of course— A true Hidalgo, free from every stain Of Moor or Hebrew blood, he traced his source Through the most Gothic gentlemen of Spain;

A better cavalier ne’er mounted horse, Or, being mounted, e’er got down again,

Than José, who begot our hero, who Begot—but that’s to come—Well, to renew:

She knew the Latin—that is, “the Lord’s prayer,” And Greek—the alphabet—I’m nearly sure; She read some French romances here and there, Although her mode of speaking was not pure; For native Spanish she had no great care, At least her conversation was obscure;

Her thoughts were theorems, her words a problem, As if she deemed that mystery would ennoble ’em.

She liked the English and the Hebrew tongue, And said there was analogy between ’em; She proved it somehow out of sacred song, But I must leave the proofs to those who’ve seen ’em;

But this I heard her say, and can’t be wrong, And all may think which way their judgments lean ’em, “ ’Tis strange—the Hebrew noun which means ‘I am,’ The English always use to govern d⸺n.”

Some women use their tongues⁠—she looked a lecture, Each eye a sermon, and her brow a homily,

An all-in-all sufficient self-director, Like the lamented late Sir Samuel Romilly, The Law’s expounder, and the State’s corrector, Whose suicide was almost an anomaly— One sad example more, that “All is vanity,”— (The jury brought their verdict in “Insanity!”)

… sermon, and her brow a homily, An all-in-all sufficient self-director, Like the lamented late Sir Samuel Romilly, The Law’s expounder, and the State’s corrector, Whose suicide was almost an anomaly— One sad example more, that “All is vanity,”— (The jury brought their verdict in “Insanity!”)

In short, she was a walking calculation,

Miss Edgeworth’s novels stepping from their covers, Or Mrs. Trimmer’s books on education, Or “Coelebs’ Wife” set out in quest of lovers, Morality’s prim personification, In which not Envy’s self a flaw discovers;

So far above the cunning powers of Hell, Her Guardian Angel had given up his garrison; Even her minutest motions went as well As those of the best time-piece made by Harrison: In virtues nothing earthly could surpass her, Save thine “incomparable oil,” Macassar!

Perfect she was, but as perfection is Insipid in this naughty world of ours,

Where our first parents never learned to kiss Till they were exiled from their earlier bowers, Where all was peace, and innocence, and bliss, (I wonder how they got through the twelve hours), Don José, like a lineal son of Eve, Went plucking various fruit …

Now Donna Inez had, with all her merit, A great opinion of her own good qualities;

Neglect, indeed, requires a saint to bear it,

And such, indeed, she was in her moralities; But then she had a devil of a spirit, And sometimes mixed up fancies with realities, And let few opportunities escape Of getting her liege lord into a scrape.

’Tis also pleasant to be deemed magnanimous, The more so in obtaining our own ends; And what the lawyers call a “malus animus” Conduct like this by no means comprehends:

Revenge in person’s certainly no virtue, But then ’tis not my fault, if others hurt you.

And if our quarrels should rip up old stories, And help them with a lie or two additional, I’m not to blame, as you well know—no more is Any one else—they were become traditional;

Besides, their resurrection aids our glories By contrast, which is what we just were wishing all: And Science profits by this resurrection—

Dead scandals form good subjects for dissection.

Their friends had tried at reconciliation, Then their relations, who made matters worse. (’Twere hard to tell upon a like occasion To whom it may be best to have recourse— I can’t say much for friend or yet relation):

Dying intestate, Juan was sole heir To a chancery suit, and messuages, and lands, Which, with a long minority and care, Promised to turn out well in proper hands: Inez became sole guardian, which was fair, And answered but to Nature’s just demands;

An only son left with an only mother Is brought up much more wisely than another.

Sagest of women, even of widows, she Resolved that Juan should be quite a paragon, And worthy of the noblest pedigree, (His Sire was of Castile, his Dam from Aragon):

Then, for accomplishments of chivalry, In case our Lord the King should go to war again,

He learned the arts of riding, fencing, gunnery, And how to scale a fortress⁠—or a nunnery.

But that which Donna Inez most desired, And saw into herself each day before all The learnèd tutors whom for him she hired, Was, that his breeding should be strictly moral:

And if she met him, though she smiled no more, She looked a sadness sweeter than her smile, As if her heart had deeper thoughts in store She must not own, but cherished more the while For that compression in its burning core;

Even Innocence itself has many a wile, And will not dare to trust itself with truth, And Love is taught hypocrisy from youth.

But Passion most dissembles, yet betrays Even by its darkness; as the blackest sky Foretells the heaviest tempest, it displays Its workings through the vainly guarded eye, And in whatever aspect it arrays Itself, ’tis still the same hypocrisy;

But Passion most dissembles, yet betrays Even by its darkness; as the blackest sky Foretells the heaviest tempest, it displays Its workings through the vainly guarded eye, And in whatever aspect it arrays Itself, ’tis still the same hypocrisy;

Coldness or Anger, even Disdain or Hate, Are masks it often wears, and still too late.

Then there were sighs, the deeper for suppression, And stolen glances, sweeter for the theft, And burning blushes, though for no transgression, Tremblings when met, and restlessness when left;

… deemed both innocent and feasible, And, surely, with a stripling of sixteen Not Scandal’s fangs could fix on much that’s seizable, Or if they did so, satisfied to mean Nothing but what was good, her breast was peaceable— A quiet conscience makes one so serene!

Christians have burnt each other, quite persuaded That all the Apostles would have done as they did.

And if in the mean time her husband died, But Heaven forbid that such a thought should cross Her brain, though in a dream! (and then she sighed) Never could she survive that common loss;

’Twas strange that one so young should thus concern His brain about the action of the sky;

If you think ’twas Philosophy that this did, I can’t help thinking puberty assisted.

He pored upon the leaves, and on the flowers, And heard a voice in all the winds; and then He thought of wood-nymphs and immortal bowers, And how the goddesses came down to men:

The last indeed’s infallibly the case: And when the spouse and friend are gone off wholly,

He wonders at their vice, and not his folly.

Thus parents also are at times short-sighted: Though watchful as the lynx, they ne’er discover, The while the wicked world beholds delighted, Young Hopeful’s mistress, or Miss Fanny’s lover, Till some confounded escapade has blighted The plan of twenty years, and all is over;

I cannot know what Juan thought of this, But what he did, is much what you would do; His young lip thanked it with a grateful kiss, And then, abashed at its own joy, withdrew In deep despair, lest he had done amiss—

Love is so very timid when ’tis new:

She blushed, and frowned not, but she strove to speak, And held her tongue, her voice was grown so weak.

The tears were gushing from her gentle eyes, I wish, indeed, they had not had occasion; But who, alas! can love, and then be wise? Not that Remorse did not oppose Temptation;

A little still she strove, and much repented, And whispering “I will ne’er consent”⁠—consented.

’Tis said that Xerxes offered a reward To those who could invent him a new pleasure: Methinks the requisition’s rather hard, And must have cost his Majesty a treasure: For my part, I’m a moderate-minded bard, Fond of a little love (which I call leisure);

you’re indeed a pleasant thing, Although one must be damned for you, no doubt: I make a resolution every spring Of reformation, ere the year run out, But somehow, this my vestal vow takes wing, Yet still, I trust, it may be kept throughout:

I’m very sorry, very much ashamed, And mean, next winter, to be quite reclaimed.

Here my chaste Muse a liberty must take— Start not! still chaster reader—she’ll be nice hence— Forward, and there is no great cause to quake;

Oh Pleasure! you’re indeed a pleasant thing, Although one must be damned for you, no doubt:

I make a resolution every spring Of reformation, ere the year run out,

But somehow, this my vestal vow takes wing, Yet still, I trust, it may be kept throughout: I’m very sorry, very much ashamed, And mean, next winter, to be quite reclaimed.

Sweet is the vintage, when the showering grapes In Bacchanal profusion reel to earth, Purple and gushing: sweet are our escapes From civic revelry to rural mirth; Sweet to the miser are his glittering heaps, Sweet to the father is his first-born’s birth,

Sweet is revenge⁠—especially to women⁠— Pillage to soldiers, prize-money to seamen.

Sweet is a legacy, and passing sweet The unexpected death of some old lady, Or gentleman of seventy years complete, Who’ve made “us youth” wait too—too long already, For an estate, or cash, or country seat, Still breaking, but with stamina so steady, That all …

’tis sometimes sweet to have our quarrels, Particularly with a tiresome friend: Sweet is old wine in bottles, ale in barrels; Dear is the helpless creature we defend Against the world; and dear the schoolboy spot We ne’er forget, though there we are forgot.

But sweeter still than this, than these, than all, Is first and passionate Love⁠—it stands alone,

Like Adam’s recollection of his fall; The Tree of Knowledge has been plucked—all ’s known— And Life yields nothing further to recall Worthy of this ambrosial sin, so shown, No doubt in fable, as the unforgiven Fire which Prometheus filched for us from Heaven.

And which in ravage the more loathsome evil is— Their real lues, or our pseudo-syphilis?

This is the patent age of new inventions For killing bodies, and for saving souls,

All propagated with the best intentions; Sir Humphry Davy’s lantern, by which coals Are safely mined for in the mode he mentions, Tombuctoo travels, voyages to the Poles Are ways to benefit mankind, as true, Perhaps, as shooting them at Waterloo.

Sir Humphry Davy’s lantern, by which coals Are safely mined for in the mode he mentions, Tombuctoo travels, voyages to the Poles Are ways to benefit mankind, as true, Perhaps, as shooting them at Waterloo.

Man’s a phenomenon, one knows not what, And wonderful beyond all wondrous measure;

’Tis pity though, in this sublime world, that Pleasure’s a sin, and sometimes Sin’s a pleasure;

Silence is best: besides, there is a tact— (That modern phrase appears to me sad stuff, But it will serve to keep my verse compact)— Which keeps, when pushed by questions rather rough, A lady always distant from the fact:

The charming creatures lie with such a grace, There’s nothing so becoming to the face.

They blush, and we believe them; at least I Have always done so; ’tis of no great use, In any case, attempting a reply, For then their eloquence grows quite profuse;

Alfonso grappled to detain the foe, And Juan throttled him to get away, And blood (’twas from the nose) began to flow; At last, as they more faintly wrestling lay, Juan contrived to give an awkward blow, And then his only garment quite gave way;

He fled, like Joseph, leaving it; but there, I doubt, all likeness ends between the pair.

Lights came at length, and men, and maids, who found An awkward spectacle their eyes before; Antonia in hysterics, Julia swooned, Alfonso leaning, breathless, by the door; Some half-torn drapery scattered on the ground, Some blood, and several footsteps, but no more:

Lights came at length, and men, and maids, who found An awkward spectacle their eyes before; Antonia in hysterics, Julia swooned, Alfonso leaning, breathless, by the door; Some half-torn drapery scattered on the ground, Some blood, and several footsteps, but no more:

Juan the gate gained, turned the key about, And liking not the inside, locked the out.

Here ends this canto.—Need I sing, or say, How Juan, naked, favoured by the night, Who favours what she should not, found his way, And reached his home in an unseemly plight?

I thought of a peruke the other day—) My heart is not much greener; and, in short, I Have squandered my whole summer while ’twas May, And feel no more the spirit to retort; I

Have spent my life, both interest and principal,

And deem not, what I deemed—my soul invincible.

and, in short, I Have squandered my whole summer while ’twas May, And feel no more the spirit to retort; I Have spent my life, both interest and principal, And deem not, what I deemed—my soul invincible.

No more⁠—no more⁠—Oh! never more on me The freshness of the heart can fall like dew,

Which out of all the lovely things we see Extracts emotions beautiful and new, Hived in our bosoms like the bag o’ the bee. Think’st thou the honey with those objects grew? Alas!

never more on me The freshness of the heart can fall like dew, Which out of all the lovely things we see Extracts emotions beautiful and new, Hived in our bosoms like the bag o’ the bee. Think’st thou the honey with those objects grew?

Alas! ’twas not in them, but in thy power To double even the sweetness of a flower.

No more—no more—Oh! never more, my heart, Canst thou be my sole world, my universe! Once all in all, but now a thing apart, Thou canst not be my blessing or my curse:

Now, like Friar Bacon’s Brazen Head, I’ve spoken, “Time is, Time was, Time’s past:”—a chymic treasure Is glittering Youth, which I have spent betimes— My heart in passion, and my head on rhymes.

What is the end of Fame? ’tis but to fill A certain portion of uncertain paper:

Some liken it to climbing up a hill, Whose summit, like all hills, is lost in vapour;

Spain may prove an exception to the rule, But then exceptions always prove its worth—

A lad of sixteen causing a divorce Puzzled his tutors very much, of course.

I can’t say that it puzzles me at all, If all things be considered: first, there was His lady-mother, mathematical, A—never mind;—his tutor, an old ass;

Well—well; the World must turn upon its axis, And all Mankind turn with it, heads or tails, And live and die, make love and pay our taxes, And as the veering wind shifts, shift our sails;

The King commands us, and the Doctor quacks us, The Priest instructs, and so our life exhales,

A little breath, love, wine, ambition, fame, Fighting, devotion, dust—perhaps a name.

First partings form a lesson hard to learn, Even nations feel this when they go to war; There is a sort of unexpressed concern, A kind of shock that sets one’s heart ajar,

At leaving even the most unpleasant people And places⁠—one keeps looking at the steeple.

But Juan had got many things to leave, His mother, and a mistress, and no wife, So that he had much better cause to grieve Than many persons more advanced in life:

attends, Beyond the best apothecary’s art, The loss of Love, the treachery of friends, Or death of those we dote on, when a part Of us dies with them as each fond hope ends:

No doubt he would have been much more pathetic, But the sea acted as a strong emetic.

Love’s a capricious power: I’ve known it hold Out through a fever caused by its own heat, But be much puzzled by a cough and cold, And find a quinsy very hard to treat;

That even the able seaman, deeming his Days nearly o’er, might be disposed to riot, As upon such occasions tars will ask For grog, and sometimes drink rum from the cask.

There’s nought, no doubt, so much the spirit calms As rum and true religion:

thus it was, Some plundered, some drank spirits, some sung psalms, The high wind made the treble, and as bass The hoarse harsh waves kept time; fright cured the qualms Of all the luckless landsmen’s sea-sick maws:

At least it is a heavy sound to me,

Who like a morning slumber⁠—for the night Shows stars and women in a better light.

And Juan, too, was helped out from his dream, Or sleep, or whatsoe’er it was, by feeling A most prodigious appetite;

but by surmise, No doubt, less of her language than her look: As he who studies fervently the skies Turns oftener to the stars than to his book,

Thus Juan learned his alpha beta better From Haidée’s glance than any graven letter.

’Tis pleasing to be schooled in a strange tongue By female lips and eyes—that is, I mean, When both the teacher and the taught are young, As was the case, at least, where I have been;

And every morn his colour freshlier came, And every day helped on his convalescence; ’Twas well, because health in the human frame

Is pleasant, besides being true Love’s essence, For health and idleness to Passion’s flame Are oil and gunpowder;

and some good lessons Are also learnt from Ceres and from Bacchus, Without whom Venus will not long attack us.

the heart’s rain! Few things surpass old wine; and they may preach Who please—the more because they preach in vain— Let us have Wine and Woman, Mirth and Laughter,

Sermons and soda-water the day after.

Man, being reasonable, must get drunk; The best of Life is but intoxication: Glory, the Grape, Love, Gold, in these are sunk The hopes of all men, and of every nation;

the heart’s rain! Few things surpass old wine; and they may preach Who please—the more because they preach in vain— Let us have Wine and Woman, Mirth and Laughter, Sermons and soda-water the day after.

Man, being reasonable, must get drunk; The best of Life is but intoxication:

Glory, the Grape, Love, Gold, in these are sunk The hopes of all men, and of every nation; Without their sap, how branchless were the trunk Of Life’s strange tree, so fruitful on occasion!

They heard the waves’ splash, and the wind so low, And saw each other’s dark eyes darting light Into each other—and, beholding this, Their lips drew near, and clung into a kiss;

A long, long kiss, a kiss of Youth, and Love,

And Beauty, all concentrating like rays Into one focus, kindled from above;

Such kisses as belong to early days, Where Heart, and Soul, and Sense, in concert move, And the blood’s lava, and the pulse a blaze,

Each kiss a heart-quake⁠—for a kiss’s strength, I think, it must be reckoned by its length.

By length I mean duration; theirs endured Heaven knows how long—no doubt they never reckoned; And if they had, they could not have secured The sum of their sensations to a second:

Haidée spoke not of scruples, asked no vows, Nor offered any; she had never heard Of plight and promises to be a spouse, Or perils by a loving maid incurred;

She was all which pure Ignorance allows, And flew to her young mate like a young bird;

And, never having dreamt of falsehood, she Had not one word to say of constancy.

So gentle, stirless, helpless, and unmoved, And all unconscious of the joy ’tis giving; All it hath felt, inflicted, passed, and proved, Hushed into depths beyond the watcher’s diving:

There lies the thing we love with all its errors And all its charms, like Death without its terrors.

The Lady watched her lover—and that hour Of Love’s, and Night’s, and Ocean’s solitude O’erflowed her soul with their united power;

Amidst the barren sand and rocks so rude She and her wave-worn love had made their bower, Where nought upon their passion could intrude, And all the stars that crowded the blue space Saw nothing happier than her glowing face.

Alas! the love of Women! it is known To be a lovely and a fearful thing;

For all of theirs upon that die is thrown, And if ’tis lost, Life hath no more to bring To them but mockeries of the past alone, And their revenge is as the tiger’s spring, Deadly, and quick, and crushing;

the stars, their nuptial torches, shed Beauty upon the beautiful they lighted: Ocean their witness, and the cave their bed, By their own feelings hallowed and united, Their priest was Solitude, and they were wed:

And they were happy⁠—for to their young eyes Each was an angel, and earth Paradise.

Oh, Love! of whom great Caesar was the suitor, Titus the master, Antony the slave, Horace, Catullus, scholars—Ovid tutor— Sappho the sage blue-stocking, in whose grave All those may leap who rather would be neuter— (Leucadia’s rock still overlooks the wave)— Oh, Love!

Oh, Love! of whom great Caesar was the suitor, Titus the master, Antony the slave, Horace, Catullus, scholars—Ovid tutor— Sappho the sage blue-stocking, in whose grave All those may leap who rather would be neuter— (Leucadia’s rock still overlooks the wave)—

Oh, Love! thou art the very God of evil, For, after all, we cannot call thee Devil.

Thou mak’st the chaste connubial state precarious, And jestest with the brows of mightiest men: Caesar and Pompey, Muhammad, Belisarius, Have much employed the Muse of History’s pen: Their lives and fortunes were extremely various, Such worthies Time will never see again;

Caesar and Pompey, Muhammad, Belisarius, Have much employed the Muse of History’s pen: Their lives and fortunes were extremely various, Such worthies Time will never see again; Yet to these four in three things the same luck holds,

They all were heroes, conquerors, and cuckolds.

Thou mak’st philosophers; there’s Epicurus And Aristippus, a material crew! Who to immoral courses would allure us By theories quite practicable too;

… killing As when she rose upon us like an Eve, ’T would save us many a heartache, many a shilling, (For we must get them anyhow, or grieve), Whereas if one sole lady pleased for ever, How pleasant for the heart, as well as liver!

The Heart is like the sky, a part of Heaven, But changes night and day, too, like the sky;

Now o’er it clouds and thunder must be driven, And Darkness and Destruction as on high: But when it hath been scorched, and pierced, and riven, Its storms expire in water-drops;

Now o’er it clouds and thunder must be driven, And Darkness and Destruction as on high: But when it hath been scorched, and pierced, and riven, Its storms expire in water-drops; the eye

Pours forth at last the Heart’s blood turned to tears, Which make the English climate of our years.

The liver is the lazaret of bile, But very rarely executes its function, For the first passion stays there such a while, That all the rest creep in and form a junction, Like knots of vipers on a dunghill’s soil— Rage, fear, hate, jealousy, revenge, …

As those who dote on odours pluck the flowers, And place them on their breast—but place to die— Thus the frail beings we would fondly cherish Are laid within our bosoms but to perish.

In her first passion Woman loves her lover, In all the others all she loves is Love,

Which grows a habit she can ne’er get over, And fits her loosely—like an easy glove, As you may find, whene’er you like to prove her: One man alone at first her heart can move;

There’s doubtless something in domestic doings Which forms, in fact, true Love’s antithesis;

Romances paint at full length people’s wooings, But only give a bust of marriages;

For no one cares for matrimonial cooings, There’s nothing wrong in a connubial kiss: Think you, if Laura had been Petrarch’s wife, He would have written sonnets all his life?

Romances paint at full length people’s wooings, But only give a bust of marriages; For no one cares for matrimonial cooings, There’s nothing wrong in a connubial kiss: Think you, if Laura had been Petrarch’s wife, He would have written sonnets all his life?

All tragedies are finished by a death, All comedies are ended by a marriage;

The future states of both are left to faith, For authors fear description might disparage The worlds to come of both, or fall beneath, And then both worlds would punish their miscarriage;

The approach of home to husbands and to sires, After long travelling by land or water, Most naturally some small doubt inspires— A female family’s a serious matter, (None trusts the sex more, or so much admires— But they hate flattery, so I never flatter);

Wives in their husbands’ absences grow subtler, And daughters sometimes run off with the butler.

An honest gentleman at his return May not have the good fortune of Ulysses; Not all lone matrons for their husbands mourn, Or show the same dislike to suitors’ kisses;

Perhaps you prophesy some sudden act, The whip, the rack, or dungeon at the least, To teach his people to be more exact, And that, proceeding at a very high rate, He showed the royal penchants of a pirate.

You’re wrong.⁠—He was the mildest mannered man That ever scuttled ship or cut a throat;

With such true breeding of a gentleman, You never could divine his real thought; No courtier could, and scarcely woman can Gird more deceit within a petticoat; Pity he loved adventurous life’s variety, He was so great a loss to good society.

If love paternal in his bosom pleaded For Haidée’s sake, is more than I can say,

But certainly to one deemed dead returning, This revel seemed a curious mode of mourning.

If all the dead could now return to life, (Which God forbid!)

These Oriental writings on the wall, Quite common in those countries, are a kind Of monitors adapted to recall, Like skulls at Memphian banquets, to the mind, The words which shook Belshazzar in his hall, And took his kingdom from him: You will find,

Though sages may pour out their wisdom’s treasure, There is no sterner moralist than Pleasure.

A Beauty at the season’s close grown hectic, A Genius who has drunk himself to death, A Rake turned methodistic, or Eclectic— (For that’s the name they like to pray beneath)— But most, an Alderman struck apoplectic, Are things that really take away the breath— …

His Polar Star being one which rather ranges, And not the fixed—he knew the way to wheedle: So vile he ’scaped the doom which oft avenges; And being fluent (save indeed when fee’d ill),

He lied with such a fervour of intention⁠— There was no doubt he earned his laureate pension.

But he had genius—when a turncoat has it, The Vates irritabilis takes care That without notice few full moons shall pass it;

And Glory long has made the sages smile; ’Tis something, nothing, words, illusion, wind— Depending more upon the historian’s style Than on the name a person leaves behind:

Troy owes to Homer what whist owes to Hoyle:

The present century was growing blind To the great Marlborough’s skill in giving knocks, Until his late Life by Archdeacon Coxe.

Some kinder casuists are pleased to say, In nameless print—that I have no devotion; But set those persons down with me to pray, And you shall see who has the properest notion Of getting into Heaven the shortest way;

My altars are the mountains and the Ocean,

Earth—air—stars,—all that springs from the great Whole, Who hath produced, and will receive the Soul.

Or fills with love the pilgrim on his way As the far bell of Vesper makes him start, Seeming to weep the dying day’s decay; Is this a fancy which our reason scorns?

Ah! surely Nothing dies but Something mourns!

When Nero perished by the justest doom Which ever the Destroyer yet destroyed, Amidst the roar of liberated Rome, Of nations freed, and the world overjoyed, Some hands unseen strewed flowers upon his tomb:

Nothing so difficult as a beginning In poesy, unless perhaps the end;

For oftentimes when Pegasus seems winning The race, he sprains a wing, and down we tend, Like Lucifer when hurled from Heaven for sinning;

While Youth’s hot wishes in our red veins revel, We know not this—the blood flows on too fast; But as the torrent widens towards the Ocean, We ponder deeply on each past emotion.

As boy, I thought myself a clever fellow, And wished that others held the same opinion;

They took it up when my days grew more mellow, And other minds acknowledged my dominion:

They took it up when my days grew more mellow, And other minds acknowledged my dominion: Now my sere Fancy “falls into the yellow Leaf,” and Imagination droops her pinion,

And the sad truth which hovers o’er my desk Turns what was once romantic to burlesque.

And if I laugh at any mortal thing, ’Tis that I may not weep;

Now my sere Fancy “falls into the yellow Leaf,” and Imagination droops her pinion, And the sad truth which hovers o’er my desk Turns what was once romantic to burlesque.

And if I laugh at any mortal thing, ’Tis that I may not weep; and if I weep,

’Tis that our nature cannot always bring Itself to apathy, for we must steep Our hearts first in the depths of Lethe’s spring, Ere what we least wish to behold will sleep: Thetis baptized her mortal son in Styx;

Some have accused me of a strange design Against the creed and morals of the land, And trace it in this poem every line:

I don’t pretend that I quite understand My own meaning when I would be very fine;

But the fact is that I have nothing planned, Unless it were to be a moment merry— A novel word in my vocabulary.

How I have treated it, I do not know; Perhaps no better than they have treated me, Who have imputed such designs as show

Not what they saw, but what they wished to see:

But if it gives them pleasure, be it so; This is a liberal age, and thoughts are free: Meantime Apollo plucks me by the ear, And tells me to resume my story here.

Haidée and Juan thought not of the dead— The Heavens, and Earth, and Air, seemed made for them: They found no fault with Time, save that he fled; They saw not in themselves aught to condemn:

Each was the other’s mirror, and but read Joy sparkling in their dark eyes like a gem,

And knew such brightness was but the reflection Of their exchanging glances of affection.

The gentle pressure, and the thrilling touch,

The least glance better understood than words, Which still said all, and ne’er could say too much;

A language, too, but like to that of birds, Known but to them, at least appearing such As but to lovers a true sense affords; Sweet playful phrases, which would seem absurd To those who have ceased to hear such, or ne’er heard—

Both maladies are taxes on our joys: But which to choose, I really hardly know; And if I had to give a casting voice, For both sides I could many reasons show, And then decide, without great wrong to either,

It were much better to have both than neither.

Juan and Haidée gazed upon each other With swimming looks of speechless tenderness, Which mixed all feelings—friend, child, lover, brother— All that the best can mingle and express When two pure hearts are poured in one another, And love too much, and yet can not …

They should have lived together deep in woods, Unseen as sings the nightingale; they were Unfit to mix in these thick solitudes Called social, haunts of Hate, and Vice, and Care:

How lonely every freeborn creature broods!

The sweetest song-birds nestle in a pair; The eagle soars alone; the gull and crow Flock o’er their carrion, just like men below.

They should have lived together deep in woods, Unseen as sings the nightingale; they were Unfit to mix in these thick solitudes Called social, haunts of Hate, and Vice, and Care: How lonely every freeborn creature broods! The sweetest song-birds nestle in a pair;

The eagle soars alone; the gull and crow Flock o’er their carrion, just like men below.

Now pillowed cheek to cheek, in loving sleep, Haidée and Juan their siesta took, A gentle slumber, but it was not deep, For ever and anon a something shook Juan, and shuddering o’er his frame would creep;

A gentlemanly distance, not too near, If you have got a former friend for foe;

But after being fired at once or twice, The ear becomes more Irish, and less nice.

Lambro presented, and one instant more Had stopped this Canto, and Don Juan’s breath, When Haidée threw herself her boy before; Stern as her sire: “On me,” she cried, “let Death Descend—the fault is mine; this fatal shore He found—but sought not.

They laid him in a boat, and plied the oar Until they reached some galliots, placed in line; On board of one of these, and under hatches, They stowed him, with strict orders to the watches.

The world is full of strange vicissitudes, And here was one exceedingly unpleasant:

A gentleman so rich in the world’s goods, Handsome and young, enjoying all the present, Just at the very time when he least broods On such a thing, is suddenly to sea sent, Wounded and chained, so that he cannot move, And all because a …

A gentleman so rich in the world’s goods, Handsome and young, enjoying all the present, Just at the very time when he least broods On such a thing, is suddenly to sea sent, Wounded and chained, so that he cannot move,

And all because a lady fell in love.

Here I must leave him, for I grow pathetic, Moved by the Chinese nymph of tears, green tea! Than whom Cassandra was not more prophetic;

there grain, and flower, and fruit, Gush from the earth until the land runs o’er; But there, too, many a poison-tree has root, And Midnight listens to the lion’s roar, And long, long deserts scorch the camel’s foot, Or heaving whelm the helpless caravan;

And as the soil is, so the heart of man.

Afric is all the Sun’s, and as her earth Her human clay is kindled; full of power For good or evil, burning from its birth, The Moorish blood partakes the planet’s hour, And like the soil beneath it will bring forth:

she arose As one who ne’er had dwelt among the sick, And flew at all she met, as on her foes; But no one ever heard her speak or shriek, Although her paroxysm drew towards its close;—

Hers was a frenzy which disdained to rave,

Even when they smote her, in the hope to save.

Valour was his, and Beauty dwelt with her: If she loved rashly, her life paid for wrong— A heavy price must all pay who thus err, In some shape; let none think to fly the danger,

For soon or late Love is his own avenger.

But let me change this theme, which grows too sad, And lay this sheet of sorrows on the shelf; I don’t much like describing people mad, For fear of seeming rather touched myself— Besides, I’ve no more on this head to add;

But let me change this theme, which grows too sad, And lay this sheet of sorrows on the shelf;

I don’t much like describing people mad, For fear of seeming rather touched myself

— Besides, I’ve no more on this head to add; And as my Muse is a capricious elf, We’ll put about, and try another tack With Juan, left half-killed some stanzas back.

But at this hour I wish to part in peace, Leaving such to the literary rabble; Whether my verse’s fame be doomed to cease While the right hand which wrote it still is able, Or of some centuries to take a lease,

The grass upon my grave will grow as long, And sigh to midnight winds, but not to song.

Of poets who come down to us through distance Of time and tongues, the foster-babes of Fame, Life seems the smallest portion of existence;

Where twenty ages gather o’er a name, ’Tis as a snowball which derives assistance From every flake, and yet rolls on the same,

Even till an iceberg it may chance to grow; But, after all, ’tis nothing but cold snow.

And so great names are nothing more than nominal, And love of Glory’s but an airy lust, Too often in its fury overcoming all Who would as ’twere identify their dust From out the wide destruction, which, entombing all, Leaves nothing till “the coming of …

Thus is the trophy used, and thus lamented Should ever be those blood-hounds, from whose wild Instinct of gore and glory Earth has known Those sufferings Dante saw in Hell alone.

Yet there will still be bards: though Fame is smoke, Its fumes are frankincense to human thought;

And the unquiet feelings, which first woke Song in the world, will seek what then they sought;

The greater their success the worse it proves, As Ovid’s verse may give to understand; Even Petrarch’s self, if judged with due severity,

Is the Platonic pimp of all posterity.

I therefore do denounce all amorous writing, Except in such a way as not to attract; Plain—simple—short, and by no means inviting, But with a moral to each error tacked, Formed rather for instructing than delighting, And with all passions in their turn attacked;

To strive, too, with our fate were such a strife As if the corn-sheaf should oppose the sickle:

Men are the sport of circumstances, when The circumstances seem the sport of men.

”

“But after all, what is our present state? ’Tis bad, and may be better—all men’s lot:

Most men are slaves, none more so than the great, To their own whims and passions, and what not;

Society itself, which should create Kindness, destroys what little we had got: To feel for none is the true social art Of the world’s Stoics—men without a heart.”

… friend, albeit they heard No Christian knoll to table, saw no line Of lackeys usher to the feast prepared, Yet smelt roast-meat, beheld a huge fire shine, And cooks in motion with their clean arms bared, And gazed around them to the left and right,

With the prophetic eye of appetite.

And giving up all notions of resistance, They followed close behind their sable guide, Who little thought that his own cracked existence Was on the point of being set aside:

Perhaps there’s nothing—I’ll not say appals, But saddens more by night as well as day, Than an enormous room without a soul To break the lifeless splendour of the whole.

Two or three seem so little, one seems nothing:

In deserts, forests, crowds, or by the shore, There Solitude, we know, has her full growth in The spots which were her realms for evermore;

In deserts, forests, crowds, or by the shore, There Solitude, we know, has her full growth in The spots which were her realms for evermore; But in a mighty hall or gallery, both in More modern buildings and those built of yore,

A kind of Death comes o’er us all alone, Seeing what’s meant for many with but one.

A neat, snug study on a winter’s night, A book, friend, single lady, or a glass Of claret, sandwich, and an appetite, Are things which make an English evening pass— Though certes by no means so grand a sight As is a theatre lit up …

… claret, sandwich, and an appetite, Are things which make an English evening pass— Though certes by no means so grand a sight As is a theatre lit up by gas— I pass my evenings in long galleries solely, And that’s the reason I’m so melancholy.

Alas! Man makes that great which makes him little

— I grant you in a church ’tis very well: What speaks of Heaven should by no means be brittle, But strong and lasting, till no tongue can tell Their names who reared it;

and in her large eyes wrought, A mixture of sensations might be scanned, Of half voluptuousness and half command.

Her form had all the softness of her sex, Her features all the sweetness of the Devil,

When he put on the Cherub to perplex Eve, and paved (God knows how) the road to evil; The Sun himself was scarce more free from specks Than she from aught at which the eye could cavil;

Our souls at least are free, and ’tis in vain We would against them make the flesh obey— The spirit in the end will have its way.

Her very smile was haughty, though so sweet; Her very nod was not an inclination;

There was a self-will even in her small feet, As though they were quite conscious of her station— They trod as upon necks;

His youth and features favoured the disguise, And should you ask how she, a Sultan’s bride, Could risk or compass such strange fantasies, This I must leave sultanas to decide:

Emperors are only husbands in wives’ eyes, And kings and consorts oft are mystified,

As we may ascertain with due precision, Some by experience, others by tradition.

Her rage was but a minute’s, and ’twas well— A moment’s more had slain her; but the while It lasted ’twas like a short glimpse of Hell:

Nought’s more sublime than energetic bile,

Though horrible to see, yet grand to tell, Like Ocean warring ’gainst a rocky isle; And the deep passions flashing through her form Made her a beautiful embodied storm.

but the while It lasted ’twas like a short glimpse of Hell: Nought’s more sublime than energetic bile, Though horrible to see, yet grand to tell, Like Ocean warring ’gainst a rocky isle;

And the deep passions flashing through her form Made her a beautiful embodied storm.

A vulgar tempest ’twere to a typhoon To match a common fury with her rage, And yet she did not want to reach the moon, Like moderate Hotspur on the immortal page;

he had made up his mind To be impaled, or quartered as a dish For dogs, or to be slain with pangs refined, Or thrown to lions, or made baits for fish, And thus heroically stood resigned, Rather than sin—except to his own wish:

But all his great preparatives for dying Dissolved like snow before a woman crying.

As through his palms Bob Acres’ valour oozed, So Juan’s virtue ebbed, I know not how; And first he wondered why he had refused; And then, if matters could be made up now;

The Sun, which yearly melts the polar ice, Has quite the contrary effect—on vice.

Thus in the East they are extremely strict, And wedlock and a padlock mean the same:

Excepting only when the former’s picked It ne’er can be replaced in proper frame; Spoilt, as a pipe of claret is when pricked: But then their own polygamy’s to blame;

If Anthony be well remembered yet, ’Tis not his conquests keep his name in fashion, But Actium, lost for Cleopatra’s eyes, Outbalances all Caesar’s victories.

He died at fifty for a queen of forty; I wish their years had been fifteen and twenty,

For then wealth, kingdoms, worlds are but a sport—I Remember when, though I had no great plenty Of worlds to lose, yet still, to pay my court, I Gave what I had—a heart; as the world went, I Gave what was worth a world;

If fair Gulbeyaz overdid her part, I know not—it succeeded, and success Is much in most things, not less in the heart Than other articles of female dress. Self-love in Man, too, beats all female art;

They lie, we lie, all lie, but love no less:

And no one virtue yet, except starvation, Could stop that worst of vices—propagation.

We leave this royal couple to repose: A bed is not a throne, and they may sleep, Whate’er their dreams be, if of joys or woes: Yet disappointed joys are woes as deep As any man’s clay mixture undergoes.

Our least of sorrows are such as we weep;

’Tis the vile daily drop on drop which wears The soul out (like the stone) with petty cares.

… cross, dog ill, A favourite horse fallen lame just as he’s mounted, A bad old woman making a worse will, Which leaves you minus of the cash you counted As certain;—these are paltry things, and yet I’ve rarely seen the man they did not fret.

I’m a philosopher; confound them all!

Bills, beasts, and men, and—no! not womankind! With one good hearty curse I vent my gall, And then my Stoicism leaves nought behind Which it can either pain or evil call, And I can give my whole soul up to mind;

The strangest thing was, beauteous, she was wholly Unconscious, albeit turned of quick seventeen, That she was fair, or dark, or short, or tall;

She never thought about herself at all.

And therefore was she kind and gentle as The Age of Gold (when gold was yet unknown, By which its nomenclature came to pass; Thus most appropriately has been shown “Lucus à non lucendo,” not what was, But what was not;

But these are foolish things to all the wise,

And I love Wisdom more than she loves me;

My tendency is to philosophise On most things, from a tyrant to a tree; But still the spouseless virgin Knowledge flies. What are we? and whence came we? what shall be Our ultimate existence? what’s our present? Are questions answerless, and yet incessant.

O Love! O Glory! what are ye who fly Around us ever, rarely to alight?

There’s not a meteor in the polar sky Of such transcendent and more fleeting flight. Chill, and chained to cold earth, we lift on high Our eyes in search of either lovely light;

And such as they are, such my present tale is, A nondescript and ever-varying rhyme,

A versified Aurora Borealis, Which flashes o’er a waste and icy clime.

When we know what all are, we must bewail us, But ne’ertheless I hope it is no crime To laugh at all things—for I wish to know What, after all, are all things—but a show?

By Swift, by Machiavel, by Rochefoucault, By Fénélon, by Luther, and by Plato; By Tillotson, and Wesley, and Rousseau,

Who knew this life was not worth a potato.

’Tis not their fault, nor mine, if this be so— For my part, I pretend not to be Cato, Nor even Diogenes.—We live and die, But which is best, you know no more than I.

By Tillotson, and Wesley, and Rousseau, Who knew this life was not worth a potato. ’Tis not their fault, nor mine, if this be so— For my part, I pretend not to be Cato, Nor even Diogenes.—

We live and die, But which is best, you know no more than I.

Socrates said, our only knowledge was “To know that nothing could be known;” a pleasant Science enough, which levels to an ass Each man of wisdom, future, past, or present. Newton (that proverb of the mind), alas!

Dogs, or men!—for I flatter you in saying That ye are dogs—your betters far—ye may Read, or read not, what I am now essaying To show ye what ye are in every way.

As little as the moon stops for the baying Of wolves, will the bright Muse withdraw one ray

From out her skies—then howl your idle wrath! While she still silvers o’er your gloomy path.

The fact’s about the same, I am secure; I sing them both, and am about to batter A town which did a famous siege endure, And was beleaguered both by land and water By Souvaroff, or Anglicè Suwarrow,

Who loved blood as an alderman loves marrow.

The fortress is called Ismail, and is placed Upon the Danube’s left branch and left bank, With buildings in the Oriental taste, But still a fortress of the foremost rank, Or was at least, unless ’tis since defaced, Which with your conquerors is a common …

Not fighting for their country or its crown, But wishing to be one day brigadiers; Also to have the sacking of a town;— A pleasant thing to young men at their years. ’Mongst them were several Englishmen of pith,

Sixteen called Thomson, and nineteen named Smith.

Jack Thomson and Bill Thomson;—all the rest Had been called “Jemmy,” after the great bard; I don’t know whether they had arms or crest, But such a godfather’s as good a card. Three of the Smiths were Peters;

But as it was mere lust of Power to o’er-arch all With its proud brow, it merits slight applause, Save for its style, which said, all in a trice, “You will take Ismail at whatever price.”

“Let there be Light! said God, and there was Light!” “Let there be Blood!” says man, and there’s a sea!

The fiat of this spoiled child of the Night (For Day ne’er saw his merits) could decree More evil in an hour, than thirty bright Summers could renovate, though they should be Lovely as those which ripened Eden’s fruit;

few are slow In thinking that their enemy is beat, (Or beaten, if you insist on grammar, though I never think about it in a heat,) But here I say the Turks were much mistaken,

Who hating hogs, yet wished to save their bacon.

For, on the sixteenth, at full gallop, drew In sight two horsemen, who were deemed Cossacques For some time, till they came in nearer view: They had but little baggage at their backs, For there were but three shirts between the two;

Or as a little dog will lead the blind, Or a bell-wether form the flock’s connection By tinkling sounds, when they go forth to victual;

Such is the sway of your great men o’er little.

The whole camp rung with joy; you would have thought That they were going to a marriage feast (This metaphor, I think, holds good as aught, Since there is discord after both at least):

But could we know them in detail, perchance In balancing the profit and the loss, War’s merit it by no means might enhance, To waste so much gold for a little dross, As hath been done, mere conquest to advance.

The drying up a single tear has more Of honest fame, than shedding seas of gore.

And why?—because it brings self-approbation;

And such they are—and such they will be found:

Not so Leonidas and Washington, Whose every battle-field is holy ground, Which breathes of nations saved, not worlds undone.

How sweetly on the ear such echoes sound! While the mere victor’s may appal or stun The servile and the vain—such names will be A watchword till the Future shall be free.

Of officers a third fell on the spot, A thing which Victory by no means boded To gentlemen engaged in the assault:

Hounds, when the huntsman tumbles, are at fault.

But here I leave the general concern To track our Hero on his path of Fame:

Perceiving nor commander nor commanded, And left at large, like a young heir, to make His way to—where he knew not—single handed; As travellers follow over bog and brake An “ignis fatuus;” or as sailors stranded Unto the nearest hut themselves betake;

So Juan, following Honour and his nose,

Rushed where the thickest fire announced most foes.

But never mind;—“God save the King!” and Kings! For if he don’t, I doubt if men will longer—

I think I hear a little bird, who sings The people by and by will be the stronger:

The veriest jade will wince whose harness wrings So much into the raw as quite to wrong her Beyond the rules of posting—and the mob At last fall sick of imitating Job.

’Tis true he shrank from men even of his nation, When they built up unto his darling trees— He moved some hundred miles off, for a station Where there were fewer houses and more ease;

The inconvenience of civilisation Is, that you neither can be pleased nor please;

But where he met the individual man, He showed himself as kind as mortal can.

The city’s taken—only part by part—

And Death is drunk with gore: there’s not a street

Where fights not to the last some desperate heart For those for whom it soon shall cease to beat. Here War forgot his own destructive art In more destroying Nature;

For checkered as is seen our human lot With good, and bad, and worse, alike prolific Of melancholy merriment, to quote Too much of one sort would be soporific;— Without, or with, offence to friends or foes,

I sketch your world exactly as it goes.

And one good action in the midst of crimes Is “quite refreshing,” in the affected phrase Of these ambrosial, Pharisaic times, With all their pretty milk-and-water ways, And may serve therefore to bedew these rhymes, A little scorched at present with the blaze Of conquest …

Two villainous Cossacques pursued the child With flashing eyes and weapons: matched with them, The rudest brute that roams Siberia’s wild Has feelings pure and polished as a gem—

The bear is civilised, the wolf is mild;

And whom for this at last must we condemn? Their natures? or their sovereigns, who employ All arts to teach their subjects to destroy?

matched with them, The rudest brute that roams Siberia’s wild Has feelings pure and polished as a gem— The bear is civilised, the wolf is mild; And whom for this at last must we condemn?

Their natures? or their sovereigns, who employ All arts to teach their subjects to destroy?

Their sabres glittered o’er her little head, Whence her fair hair rose twining with affright, Her hidden face was plunged amidst the dead:

And yet the rest rushed eagerly—no wonder, For they were heated by the hope of gain, A thing which happens everywhere each day— No hero trusteth wholly to half pay.

And such is Victory, and such is Man!

At least nine tenths of what we call so:—God May have another name for half we scan As human beings, or his ways are odd. But to our subject:

even as sometimes nods The rugged tree unto the summer wind,

Compassion breathes along the savage mind.

But he would not be taken, and replied To all the propositions of surrender By mowing Christians down on every side, As obstinate as Swedish Charles at Bender. His five brave boys no less the foe defied;

Cockneys of London! Muscadins of Paris!

Just ponder what a pious pastime War is.

Think how the joys of reading a Gazette Are purchased by all agonies and crimes: Or if these do not move you, don’t forget Such doom may be your own in after-times.

Cockneys of London! Muscadins of Paris! Just ponder what a pious pastime War is.

Think how the joys of reading a Gazette Are purchased by all agonies and crimes:

Or if these do not move you, don’t forget Such doom may be your own in after-times. Meantime the Taxes, Castlereagh, and Debt, Are hints as good as sermons, or as rhymes.

Howe’er the mighty locust, Desolation, Strip your green fields, and to your harvests cling, Gaunt famine never shall approach the throne—

Though Ireland starve, great George weighs twenty stone.

But let me put an end unto my theme: There was an end of Ismail—hapless town! Far flashed her burning towers o’er Danube’s stream, And redly ran his blushing waters down. The horrid war-whoop and the shriller scream Rose still;

You are “the best of cut-throats:”—do not start; The phrase is Shakespeare’s, and not misapplied:—

War’s a brain-spattering, windpipe-slitting art, Unless her cause by right be sanctified.

If you have acted once a generous part, The World, not the World’s masters, will decide, And I shall be delighted to learn who, Save you and yours, have gained by Waterloo?

“O dura ilia messorum!”—“Oh Ye rigid guts of reapers!” I translate For the great benefit of those who know What indigestion is—that inward fate Which makes all Styx through one small liver flow.

A peasant’s sweat is worth his lord’s estate:

Let this one toil for bread—that rack for rent, He who sleeps best may be the most content.

I translate For the great benefit of those who know What indigestion is—that inward fate Which makes all Styx through one small liver flow. A peasant’s sweat is worth his lord’s estate: Let this one toil for bread—that rack for rent,

He who sleeps best may be the most content.

“To be, or not to be?”—Ere I decide, I should be glad to know that which is being. ’Tis true we speculate both far and wide, And deem, because we see, we are all-seeing:

“Que scais-je” was the motto of Montaigne, As also of the first academicians: That all is dubious which man may attain, Was one of their most favourite positions. There’s no such thing as certainty, that’s plain As any of Mortality’s conditions;

So little do we know what we’re about in This world, I doubt if doubt itself be doubting.

It is a pleasant voyage perhaps to float, Like Pyrrho, on a sea of speculation; But what if carrying sail capsize the boat? Your wise men don’t know much of navigation; And swimming long in the abyss of thought Is apt to tire:

yours) Was left upon his way to the chief city Of the immortal Peter’s polished boors, Who still have shown themselves more brave than witty. I know its mighty Empire now allures Much flattery—even Voltaire’s, and that’s a pity.

For me, I deem an absolute autocrat Not a barbarian, but much worse than that.

And I will war, at least in words (and—should My chance so happen—deeds), with all who war With Thought;—and of Thought’s foes by far most rude, Tyrants and sycophants have been and are. I know not who may conquer:

He

Seems Love turned a Lieutenant of Artillery!

His bandage slipped down into a cravat— His wings subdued to epaulettes—his quiver Shrunk to a scabbard, with his arrows at His side as a small sword, but sharp as ever— His bow converted into a cocked hat— But still so like, that Psyche were …

Glory and triumph o’er her aspect burst, As an East Indian sunrise on the main:— These quenched a moment her Ambition’s thirst— So Arab deserts drink in Summer’s rain: In vain!—As fall the dews on quenchless sands,

Blood only serves to wash Ambition’s hands!

Her next amusement was more fanciful; She smiled at mad Suwarrow’s rhymes, who threw Into a Russian couplet rather dull The whole gazette of thousands whom he slew:

If once beyond her boudoir’s precincts in ye went, Your “fortune” was in a fair way “to swell A man” (as Giles says); for though she would widow all Nations, she liked Man as an individual.

What a strange thing is Man! and what a stranger Is Woman!

What a whirlwind is her head, And what a whirlpool full of depth and danger Is all the rest about her! Whether wed, Or widow—maid—or mother, she can change her Mind like the wind:

… of a boy to men much bigger (Fellows whom Messalina’s self would pension), Her prime of life, just now in juicy vigour, With other extras, which we need not mention— All these, or any one of these, explain Enough to make a stripling very vain.

And that’s enough, for Love is vanity, Selfish in its beginning as its end,

Except where ’tis a mere insanity, A maddening spirit which would strive to blend Itself with Beauty’s frail inanity, On which the Passion’s self seems to depend; And hence some heathenish philosophers Make Love the main-spring of the Universe.

How beautiful that moment! and how odd is That fever which precedes the languid rout Of our sensations!

What a curious way The whole thing is of clothing souls in clay!

The noblest kind of love is love Platonical, To end or to begin with; the next grand Is that which may be christened love canonical, Because the clergy take the thing in hand;

And this is the sole mortal who could grapple, Since Adam—with a fall—or with an apple.

Man fell with apples, and with apples rose,

If this be true; for we must deem the mode In which Sir Isaac Newton could disclose Through the then unpaved stars the turnpike road, A thing to counterbalance human woes:

Some reckon women by their suns or years, I rather think the Moon should date the dears.

And why? because she’s changeable and chaste:

I know no other reason, whatsoe’er Suspicious people, who find fault in haste, May choose to tax me with; which is not fair, Nor flattering to “their temper or their taste,” As my friend Jeffrey writes with such an air:

Had such been cut in Phaeton’s time, the god Had told his son to satisfy his craving With the York mail;—but onward as we roll, Surgit amari aliquid—the toll!

Alas! how deeply painful is all payment!

Take lives—take wives—take aught except men’s purses: As Machiavel shows those in purple raiment, Such is the shortest way to general curses.

Alas! how deeply painful is all payment! Take lives—take wives—take aught except men’s purses: As Machiavel shows those in purple raiment, Such is the shortest way to general curses. They hate a murderer much less than a claimant On that sweet ore which everybody nurses.—

Kill a man’s family, and he may brook it, But keep your hands out of his breeches’ pocket:

So said the Florentine: ye monarchs, hearken To your instructor.

’Twas there— I look for it—’tis gone, a globe of glass! Cracked, shivered, vanished, scarcely gazed on, ere A silent change dissolves the glittering mass. Statesmen, Chiefs, Orators, Queens, Patriots, Kings, And Dandies—all are gone on the Wind’s wings.

Where is Napoleon the Grand? God knows! Where little Castlereagh? The devil can tell!

Where Grattan, Curran, Sheridan—all those Who bound the Bar or Senate in their spell? Where is the unhappy Queen, with all her woes? And where the Daughter, whom the Isles loved well? Where are those martyred saints the Five per Cents?

in seven I have seen more changes, down from monarchs to The humblest individuals under Heaven, Than might suffice a moderate century through. I knew that nought was lasting, but now even Change grows too changeable, without being new:

Nought’s permanent among the human race, Except the Whigs not getting into place.

I have seen Napoleon, who seemed quite a Jupiter, Shrink to a Saturn. I have seen a Duke (No matter which) turn politician stupider, If that can well be, than his wooden look.

I knew that nought was lasting, but now even Change grows too changeable, without being new: Nought’s permanent among the human race, Except the Whigs not getting into place.

I have seen Napoleon, who seemed quite a Jupiter, Shrink to a Saturn.

I have seen a Duke (No matter which) turn politician stupider, If that can well be, than his wooden look.

To-morrow sees another race as gay And transient, and devoured by the same harpy. “Life’s a poor player,”—then “play out the play, Ye villains!” and above all keep a sharp eye Much less on what you do than what you say:

Be hypocritical, be cautious, be Not what you seem, but always what you see.

But how shall I relate in other cantos Of what befell our hero in the land, Which ’tis the common cry and lie to vaunt as A moral country? But I hold my hand— For I disdain to write an Atalantis;

Cash rules the Grove, and fells it too besides; Without cash, camps were thin, and courts were none; Without cash, Malthus tells you—“take no brides.” So Cash rules Love the ruler, on his own High ground, as virgin Cynthia sways the tides:

And as for “Heaven being Love,” why not say honey Is wax? Heaven is not Love, ’tis Matrimony.

Is not all Love prohibited whatever, Excepting Marriage? which is Love, no doubt, After a sort; but somehow people never With the same thought the two words have helped out. Love may exist with Marriage, and should ever, And Marriage also may exist without;

And these vicissitudes tell best in youth; For when they happen at a riper age, People are apt to blame the Fates, forsooth, And wonder Providence is not more sage.

Adversity is the first path to Truth:

He who hath proved War—Storm—or Woman’s rage, Whether his winters be eighteen or eighty, Hath won the experience which is deemed so weighty.

When the body of the Book’s begun, You’ll find it of a different construction From what some people say ’twill be when done; The plan at present ’s simply in concoction. I can’t oblige you, reader, to read on;

That’s your affair, not mine: a real spirit Should neither court neglect, nor dread to bear it.

And if my thunderbolt not always rattles, Remember, reader! you have had before, The worst of tempests and the best of battles, That e’er were brewed from elements or gore, Besides the most sublime of—Heaven knows what else;

And is there not Religion, and Reform, Peace, War, the taxes, and what’s called the “Nation”? The struggle to be pilots in a storm? The landed and the monied speculation? The joys of mutual hate to keep them warm, Instead of Love, that mere hallucination?

Now Hatred is by far the longest pleasure; Men love in haste, but they detest at leisure.

Rough Johnson, the great moralist, professed, Right honestly, “he liked an honest hater!”— The only truth that yet has been confessed Within these latest thousand years or later.

Opposing singly the united strong, From foreign yoke to free the helpless native:— Alas! must noblest views, like an old song, Be for mere Fancy’s sport a theme creative, A jest, a riddle, Fame through thin and thick sought! And Socrates himself but Wisdom’s Quixote?

Cervantes smiled Spain’s chivalry away;

A single laugh demolished the right arm Of his own country;—seldom since that day Has Spain had heroes. While Romance could charm, The World gave ground before her bright array;

I’m “at my old lunes”—digression, and forget The Lady Adeline Amundeville; The fair most fatal Juan ever met, Although she was not evil nor meant ill; But Destiny and Passion spread the net

(Fate is a good excuse for our own will)

, And caught them;—what do they not catch, methinks? But I’m not Oedipus, and Life’s a Sphinx.

I tell the tale as it is told, nor dare To venture a solution: “Davus sum!” And now I will proceed upon the pair. Sweet Adeline, amidst the gay World’s hum, Was the Queen-Bee, the glass of all that’s fair;

Whose charms made all men speak, and women dumb.

The last’s a miracle, and such was reckoned, And since that time there has not been a second.

And thus the chilliest aspects may concentre A hidden nectar under a cold presence. And such are many—though I only meant her From whom I now deduce these moral lessons, On which the Muse has always sought to enter.

And your cold people are beyond all price, When once you’ve broken their confounded ice.

But after all they are a North-West Passage Unto the glowing India of the soul; And as the good ships sent upon that message Have not exactly ascertained the Pole (Though Parry’s efforts look a lucky presage), Thus gentlemen may run upon a shoal;

Our ridicules are kept in the back-ground— Ridiculous enough, but also dull; Professions, too, are no more to be found Professional; and there is nought to cull Of Folly’s fruit; for though your fools abound, They’re barren, and not worth the pains to pull.

Society is now one polished horde, Formed of two mighty tribes, the Bores and Bored.

But from being farmers, we turn gleaners, gleaning The scanty but right-well threshed ears of Truth; And, gentle reader! when you gather meaning, You may be Boaz, and I—modest Ruth. Further I’d quote, but Scripture intervening Forbids.

that’s to say, the Clergy—who Upon my head have bid their thunders break In pious libels by no means a few. And yet I can’t help scribbling once a week, Tiring old readers, nor discovering new.

In Youth I wrote because my mind was full, And now because I feel it growing dull.

But “why then publish?”—There are no rewards Of fame or profit when the World grows weary. I ask in turn—Why do you play at cards? Why drink? Why read?—To make some hour less dreary.

Why drink? Why read?—To make some hour less dreary. It occupies me to turn back regards On what I’ve seen or pondered, sad or cheery; And what I write I cast upon the stream, To swim or sink—I have had at least my dream.

I think that were I certain of success, I hardly could compose another line:

So long I’ve battled either more or less, That no defeat can drive me from the Nine. This feeling ’tis not easy to express, And yet ’tis not affected, I opine.

Besides, my Muse by no means deals in fiction: She gathers a repertory of facts, Of course with some reserve and slight restriction, But mostly sings of human things and acts— And that’s one cause she meets with contradiction;

For too much truth, at first sight, ne’er attracts;

And were her object only what’s called Glory, With more ease too she’d tell a different story.

Regretting much that she had chosen so bad a line, And waxing chiller in her courtesy, Looked grave and pale to see her friend’s fragility, For which most friends reserve their sensibility.

There’s nought in this bad world like sympathy: ’Tis so becoming to the soul and face,

Sets to soft music the harmonious sigh, And robes sweet Friendship in a Brussels lace. Without a friend, what were Humanity, To hunt our errors up with a good grace? Consoling us with—“Would you had thought twice! Ah! if you had but followed my advice!”

’Tis better on the whole to have felt and seen That which Humanity may bear, or bear not: ’Twill teach discernment to the sensitive, And not to pour their Ocean in a sieve.

Of all the horrid, hideous notes of woe, Sadder than owl-songs or the midnight blast, Is that portentous phrase, “I told you so,”

Uttered by friends, those prophets of the past, Who, ’stead of saying what you now should do, Own they foresaw that you would fall at last, And solace your slight lapse ’gainst bonos mores, With a long memorandum of old stories.

If free from Passion, which all Friendship checks, And your true feelings fully understood, No friend like to a woman Earth discovers, So that you have not been nor will be lovers.

Love bears within its breast the very germ Of Change; and how should this be otherwise?

That violent things more quickly find a term Is shown through Nature’s whole analogies; And how should the most fierce of all be firm? Would you have endless lightning in the skies? Methinks Love’s very title says enough:

and how should this be otherwise? That violent things more quickly find a term Is shown through Nature’s whole analogies; And how should the most fierce of all be firm? Would you have endless lightning in the skies?

Methinks Love’s very title says enough: How should “the tender passion” e’er be tough?

Alas! by all experience, seldom yet (I merely quote what I have heard from many) Had lovers not some reason to regret The passion which made Solomon a zany.

What “antres vast and deserts idle,” then, Would be discovered in the human soul! What icebergs in the hearts of mighty men, With self-love in the centre as their Pole! What Anthropophagi are nine of ten Of those who hold the kingdoms in control!

Were things but only called by their right name, Caesar himself would be ashamed of Fame.

But all are better than the sigh suppressed, Corroding in the cavern of the heart, Making the countenance a masque of rest And turning Human Nature to an art.

Few men dare show their thoughts of worst or best;

Dissimulation always sets apart A corner for herself; and, therefore, Fiction Is that which passes with least contradiction.

And as for Love—O Love!—We will proceed:— The Lady Adeline Amundeville, A pretty name as one would wish to read, Must perch harmonious on my tuneful quill. There’s Music in the sighing of a reed; There’s Music in the gushing of a rill;

There’s Music in all things, if men had ears: Their Earth is but an echo of the Spheres.

The Lady Adeline, Right Honourable, And honoured, ran a risk of growing less so; For few of the soft sex are very stable In their resolves—alas! that I should say so;

A page where Time should hesitate to print age, And for which Nature might forego her debt— Sole creditor whose process doth involve in’t The luck of finding everybody solvent.

O Death! thou dunnest of all duns! thou daily Knockest at doors, at first with modest tap,

Like a meek tradesman when approaching palely Some splendid debtor he would take by sap: But oft denied, as Patience ’gins to fail, he Advances with exasperated rap, And (if let in) insists, in terms unhandsome, On ready money, or “a draft on Ransom.”

but Women hear with more good humour Such aberrations than we men of rigour: Besides, his conduct, since in England, grew more Strict, and his mind assumed a manlier vigour: Because he had, like Alcibiades, The art of living in all climes with ease.

His manner was perhaps the more seductive, Because he ne’er seemed anxious to seduce;

Nothing affected, studied, or constructive Of coxcombry or conquest: no abuse Of his attractions marred the fair perspective, To indicate a Cupidon broke loose, And seem to say, “Resist us if you can”— Which makes a Dandy while it spoils a Man.

As, if they told the truth, could well be shown. But, right or wrong, Don Juan was without it; In fact, his manner was his own alone: Sincere he was—at least you could not doubt it, In listening merely to his voice’s tone.

The Devil hath not in all his quiver’s choice An arrow for the Heart like a sweet voice.

By nature soft, his whole address held off Suspicion: though not timid, his regard Was such as rather seemed to keep aloof, To shield himself than put you on your guard:

Adeline, no deep judge of character, Was apt to add a colouring from her own: ’Tis thus the Good will amiably err, And eke the Wise, as has been often shown.

Experience is the chief philosopher, But saddest when his science is well known:

And persecuted Sages teach the Schools Their folly in forgetting there are fools.

I perch upon an humbler promontory, Amidst Life’s infinite variety: With no great care for what is nicknamed Glory, But speculating as I cast mine eye On what may suit or may not suit my story, And never straining hard to versify,

I rattle on exactly as I’d talk With anybody in a ride or walk.

I don’t know that there may be much ability Shown in this sort of desultory rhyme; But there’s a conversational facility, Which may round off an hour upon a time.

’Tis a flight Which seems at first to need no lofty wing, Plumed by Longinus or the Stagyrite: The difficulty lies in colouring (Keeping the due proportions still in sight) With Nature manners which are artificial, And rend’ring general that which is especial.

The difference is, that in the days of old Men made the Manners; Manners now make men⁠—

Pinned like a flock, and fleeced too in their fold, At least nine, and a ninth beside of ten.

but what did it matter?

Love’s riotous, but Marriage should have quiet, And being consumptive, live on a milk diet.

And then there was the Miss Audacia Shoestring, A dashing demoiselle of good estate, Whose heart was fixed upon a star or blue string;

Early in years, and yet more infantine In figure, she had something of Sublime In eyes which sadly shone, as Seraphs’ shine. All Youth—but with an aspect beyond Time; Radiant and grave—as pitying Man’s decline; Mournful—but mournful of another’s crime,

She looked as if she sat by Eden’s door, And grieved for those who could return no more.

She was a Catholic, too, sincere, austere, As far as her own gentle heart allowed, And deemed that fallen worship far more dear Perhaps because ’twas fallen:

It was not envy—Adeline had none; Her place was far beyond it, and her mind: It was not scorn—which could not light on one Whose greatest fault was leaving few to find: It was not jealousy, I think—but shun Following the ignes fatui of Mankind:

It was not⁠—but ’tis easier far, alas! To say what it was not than what it was.

Little Aurora deemed she was the theme Of such discussion. She was there a guest;

I say, in my slight way I may proceed To play upon the surface of Humanity.

I write the World, nor care if the World read, At least for this I cannot spare its vanity.

My Muse hath bred, and still perhaps may breed More foes by this same scroll: when I began it, I Thought that it might turn out so—now I know it, But still I am, or was, a pretty poet.

Also the conference which we have seen Was not such as to encourage him to shine, For Adeline, addressing few words to him, With two transcendent eyes seemed to look through him.

I sometimes almost think that eyes have ears:

This much is sure, that, out of earshot, things Are somehow echoed to the pretty dears, Of which I can’t tell whence their knowledge springs.

This much is sure, that, out of earshot, things Are somehow echoed to the pretty dears, Of which I can’t tell whence their knowledge springs. Like that same mystic music of the spheres, Which no one hears, so loudly though it rings,

’Tis wonderful how oft the sex have heard Long dialogues⁠—which passed without a word!

Aurora sat with that indifference Which piques a preux chevalier—as it ought: Of all offences that’s the worst offence, Which seems to hint you are not worth a thought. Now Juan, though no coxcomb in pretence, Was not exactly pleased to be so caught;

Aurora sat with that indifference Which piques a preux chevalier—as it ought:

Of all offences that’s the worst offence, Which seems to hint you are not worth a thought.

Now Juan, though no coxcomb in pretence, Was not exactly pleased to be so caught; Like a good ship entangled among ice— And after so much excellent advice.

If people contradict themselves, can I Help contradicting them, and everybody, Even my veracious self?—But that’s a lie: I never did so, never will—how should I?

He who doubts all things nothing can deny:

Truth’s fountains may be clear—her streams are muddy, And cut through such canals of contradiction, That she must often navigate o’er fiction.

If people contradict themselves, can I Help contradicting them, and everybody, Even my veracious self?—But that’s a lie: I never did so, never will—how should I? He who doubts all things nothing can deny:

Truth’s fountains may be clear⁠—her streams are muddy,

And cut through such canals of contradiction, That she must often navigate o’er fiction.

Apologue, Fable, Poesy, and Parable, Are false, but may be rendered also true, By those who sow them in a land that’s arable:

’Tis wonderful what Fable will not do!

’Tis said it makes Reality more bearable: But what’s Reality? Who has its clue? Philosophy? No; she too much rejects. Religion? Yes; but which of all her sects?

’Tis wonderful what Fable will not do! ’Tis said it makes Reality more bearable: But what’s Reality? Who has its clue? Philosophy? No; she too much rejects. Religion? Yes; but which of all her sects?

Some millions must be wrong, that’s pretty clear; Perhaps it may turn out that all were right.

God help us! Since we have need on our career To keep our holy beacons always bright, ’Tis time that some new prophet should appear, Or old indulge man with a second sight.

Perhaps it may turn out that all were right. God help us! Since we have need on our career To keep our holy beacons always bright, ’Tis time that some new prophet should appear, Or old indulge man with a second sight.

Opinions wear out in some thousand years, Without a small refreshment from the spheres.

But here again, why will I thus entangle Myself with Metaphysics? None can hate So much as I do any kind of wrangle;

And do not think I mean to sneer at most Of these things, or by ridicule benumb That source of the Sublime and the Mysterious:— For certain reasons my belief is serious.

Serious? You laugh;⁠—you may: that will I not; My smiles must be sincere or not at all.

I say I do believe a haunted spot Exists—and where? That shall I not recall, Because I’d rather it should be forgot, “Shadows the soul of Richard” may appal. In short, upon that subject I’ve some qualms very Like those of the philosopher of Malmsbury.

but brings Shadows;—but you must be in my condition, Before you learn to call this superstition.

Between two worlds Life hovers like a star, ’Twixt Night and Morn, upon the horizon’s verge.

How little do we know that which we are! How less what we may be! The eternal surge Of Time and Tide rolls on and bears afar Our bubbles; as the old burst, new emerge, Lashed from the foam of ages;

Between two worlds Life hovers like a star, ’Twixt Night and Morn, upon the horizon’s verge.

How little do we know that which we are! How less what we may be!

The eternal surge Of Time and Tide rolls on and bears afar Our bubbles; as the old burst, new emerge, Lashed from the foam of ages; while the graves Of Empires heave but like some passing waves.

The last thin petticoats were vanished, gone Like fleecy clouds into the sky retired, And nothing brighter gleamed through the saloon Than dying tapers—and the peeping moon.

The evaporation of a joyous day Is like the last glass of champagne, without The foam which made its virgin bumper gay;

Or like a system coupled with a doubt; Or like a soda bottle when its spray Has sparkled and let half its spirit out; Or like a billow left by storms behind, Without the animation of the wind;

their buried locks still wave Along the canvas; their eyes glance like dreams On ours, or spars within some dusky cave, But Death is imaged in their shadowy beams.

A picture is the past; even ere its frame Be gilt, who sate hath ceased to be the same.

As Juan mused on Mutability, Or on his Mistress—terms synonymous— No sound except the echo of his sigh Or step ran sadly through that antique house;

But I’m too late, and therefore must make play. ’Twas a great banquet, such as Albion old Was wont to boast—as if a glutton’s tray Were something very glorious to behold. But ’twas a public feast and public day—

Quite full⁠—right dull⁠—guests hot, and dishes cold⁠—

Great plenty, much formality, small cheer— And everybody out of their own sphere.

how wondrous are thy ways! Who would suppose thy gifts sometimes obdurate?) Gave him, to lay the Devil who looks o’er Lincoln, A fat fen vicarage, and nought to think on.

His jokes were sermons, and his sermons jokes;

But both were thrown away amongst the fens; For Wit hath no great friend in aguish folks. No longer ready ears and short-hand pens Imbibed the gay bon-mot, or happy hoax:

True, she said little—’twas the rest that broke Forth into universal epigram; But then ’twas to the purpose what she spoke: Like Addison’s “faint praise,” so wont to damn, Her own but served to set off every joke, As music chimes in with a melodrame.

How sweet the task to shield an absent friend! I ask but this of mine, to⁠—not defend.

There were but two exceptions to this keen Skirmish of wits o’er the departed; one, Aurora, with her pure and placid mien;

and his mouth too. Surprise has this effect—to make one dumb, Yet leave the gate which Eloquence slips through As wide as if a long speech were to come. Nigh and more nigh the awful echoes drew, Tremendous to a mortal tympanum:

His eyes were open, and (as was before Stated) his mouth. What opened next?⁠—the door.

It opened with a most infernal creak, Like that of Hell. “Lasciate ogni speranza, Voi, ch’ entrate!” The hinge seemed to speak, Dreadful as Dante’s rima, or this stanza; Or—but all words upon such themes are weak:

Were his eyes open?—Yes! and his mouth too.

Surprise has this effect⁠—to make one dumb, Yet leave the gate which Eloquence slips through As wide as if a long speech were to come.

Nigh and more nigh the awful echoes drew, Tremendous to a mortal tympanum: His eyes were open, and (as was before Stated) his mouth. What opened next?—the door.

but being sick of shaking, He first inclined to think he had been mistaken; And then to be ashamed of such mistaking; His own internal ghost began to awaken Within him, and to quell his corporal quaking—

Hinting that Soul and Body on the whole Were odds against a disembodied Soul.

And then his dread grew wrath, and his wrath fierce, And he arose, advanced—the Shade retreated;

It touched no soul, nor body, but the wall, On which the moonbeams fell in silvery showers, Chequered with all the tracery of the Hall; He shuddered, as no doubt the bravest cowers When he can’t tell what ’tis that doth appal.

How odd, a single hobgoblin’s nonentity Should cause more fear than a whole host’s identity!

But still the Shade remained: the blue eyes glared, And rather variably for stony death; Yet one thing rather good the grave had spared, The Ghost had a remarkably sweet breath: A straggling curl showed he had been fair-haired;

Pythagoras, Locke, Socrates—but pages Might be filled up, as vainly as before, With the sad usage of all sorts of sages, Who in his life-time, each, was deemed a Bore!

The loftiest minds outrun their tardy ages:

This they must bear with and, perhaps, much more; The wise man’s sure when he no more can share it, he Will have a firm Post Obit on posterity.

Just as I make my mind up every day, To be a “totus, teres,” Stoic, Sage, The wind shifts and I fly into a rage.

Temperate I am⁠—yet never had a temper; Modest I am⁠—yet with some slight assurance;

Changeable too—yet somehow “Idem semper:” Patient—but not enamoured of endurance; Cheerful—but, sometimes, rather apt to whimper: Mild—but at times a sort of “Hercules furens:” So that I almost think that the same skin For one without—has two or three within.

Temperate I am—yet never had a temper; Modest I am—yet with some slight assurance; Changeable too—yet somehow “Idem semper:” Patient—but not enamoured of endurance; Cheerful—but, sometimes, rather apt to whimper: Mild—but at times a sort of “Hercules furens:”

So that I almost think that the same skin For one without⁠—has two or three within.

Our Hero was, in Canto the Sixteenth, Left in a tender moonlight situation, Such as enables Man to show his strength Moral or physical: