The Works of Thomas Love Peacock :: :: University of Virginia Library

228

“OH BLEST ARE THEY, AND THEY ALONE”

Oh blest are they, and they alone,
To fame to wealth to power unknown;
Whose lives in one perpetual tenor glide,
Nor feel one influence of malignant fate:

229

For when the gods on mortals frown
They pour no single vengeance down,
But scatter ruin vast and wide
On all the race they hate.
Then ill on ill succeeding still,
With unrelaxing fury pours,
As wave on wave the breakers rave
Tumultuous on the wreck-strown shores,
When northern tempests sweep
The wild and wintry deep,
Uprending from its depths the sable sand,
Which blackening eddies whirl,
And crested surges hurl
Against the rocky bulwarks of the land,
While to the tumult, deepening round,
The repercussive caves resound.