Page:Modern poets and poetry of Spain.djvu/69

And thus worn out in mid career the cost,
Before life ends he finds his senses lost.

 O bitter pleasures! O, what madness sore
Is theirs who covet them, and such implore
Humbly before a lying deity!
How the perfidious goddess to agree
But mocks them! Though perhaps at first she smile,
Exempt from pain and misery the long while
She never leaves them, and in place of joy
Gives what they ask, with weariness to cloy.
If trusted, soon is found experience taught
What ill-foreseen condition they have sought.
Niggard their wishes ever to fulfil,
Fickle in favour, vacillating still,
Inconstant, cruel, she afflicts today,
And casts down headlong to distress a prey,
Whom yesterday she flatter'd to upraise:
And now another from the mire she sways
Exalted to the clouds; but raised in vain,
With louder noise to cast him down again.
Seest thou not there a countless multitude,
Thronging her temple round, and oft renew'd,
Seeking admittance, and to offer fraught
With horrid incense, for their idol brought?
Fly from her; let not the contagion find

The base example enter in thy mind.