Gran fortuna e ’l saper.

Wisdom is riches great and great estate,
    Far above wealth; nor are the wise unblest
    If born of lineage vile or race oppressed: 
    These by their doom sublime they illustrate.

They have their griefs for guerdon, to dilate
    Their name and glory; nay, the cross, the sword
    Make them to be like saints or God adored;
    And gladness greets them in the frowns of fate: 

For joys and sorrows are their dear delight;
    Even as a lover takes the weal and woe
    Felt for his lady.  Such is wisdom’s might.

But wealth still vexes fools; more vile they grow
    By being noble; and their luckless light
    With each new misadventure burns more low.

XII.

A PARABLE OF WISE MEN AND THE WORLD.

Gli astrologi antevista.

Once on a time the astronomers foresaw
    The coming of a star to madden men: 
    Thus warned they fled the land, thinking that when
    The folk were crazed, they’d hold the reins of law

When they returned the realm to overawe,
    They prayed those maniacs to quit cave and den,
    And use their old good customs once again;
    But these made answer with fist, tooth, and claw: 

So that the wise men were obliged to rule
    Themselves like lunatics to shun grim death,
    Seeing the biggest maniac now was king.

Stifling their sense, they lived, aping the fool,
    In public praising act and word and thing
    Just as the whims of madmen swayed their breath.

XIII.

THE WORLD’S A STAGE.

Nel teatro del mondo.

The world’s a theatre:  age after age,
    Souls masked and muffled in their fleshly gear
    Before the supreme audience appear,
    As Nature, God’s own Art, appoints the stage.

Each plays the part that is his heritage;
    From choir to choir they pass, from sphere to sphere,
    And deck themselves with joy or sorry cheer,
    As Fate the comic playwright fills the page.

None do or suffer, be they cursed or blest,
    Aught otherwise than the great Wisdom wrote
    To gladden each and all who gave Him mirth,

When we at last to sea or air or earth
    Yielding these masks that weal or woe denote,
    In God shall see who spoke and acted best.

XIV.

THE HUMAN COMEDY.

Natura dal Signor.

Nature, by God directed, formed in space
    The universal comedy we see;
    Wherein each star, each man, each entity,
    Each living creature, hath its part and place: 

And when the play is over, it shall be
    That God will judge with justice and with grace.—­
    Aping this art divine, the human race
    Plans for itself on earth a comedy: