icule,--which, as the wind,
Blew where it listed, laying all things prone,--
Now to o'erthrow a fool, and now to shake a throne.[344]

CVII.

The other, deep and slow, exhausting thought,[kt]
And hiving wisdom with each studious year,
In meditation dwelt--with learning wrought,
And shaped his weapon with an edge severe,
Sapping a solemn creed with solemn sneer;
The lord of irony,--that master-spell,
Which stung his foes to wrath, which grew from fear[ku][345]
And doomed him to the zealot's ready Hell,
Which answers to all doubts so eloquently well.

CVIII.

Yet, peace be with their ashes,--for by them,
If merited, the penalty is paid;
It is not ours to judge,--far less condemn;
The hour must come when such things shall be made
Known unto all,--or hope and dread allayed
By slumber, on one pillow, in the dust,[kv]
Which, thus much we are sure, must lie decayed;
And when it shall revive, as is our trust,[346]
'Twill be to be forgiven--or suffer what is just.

CIX.

But let me quit Man's works, again to read
His Maker's, spread around me, and suspend
This page, which from my reveries I feed,
Until it seems prolonging without end.
The clouds above me to the white Alps tend,
And I must pierce them, and survey whate'er[347]
May be permitted, as my steps I bend
To their most great and growing region, where
The earth to her embrace compels the powers of air.

CX.

Italia too! Italia! looking on thee,
Full flashes on the Soul the light of ages,
Since the fierce Carthaginian almost won thee,
To the last halo of the Chiefs and Sages
Who glorify thy consecrated pages;
Thou wert the throne and grave of empires; still,[348]
The fount at which the panting Mind assuages
Her thirst of knowledge, quaffing there her fill,
Flows from the eternal source of Rome's imperial hill.

CXI.

Thus far have I proceeded in a theme
Renewed with no kind auspices:--to feel
We are not what we have been, and to deem
We are not what we should be,--and to steel
The heart against itself; and to conceal,
With a proud caution, love, or hate, or aught,--