VI.

"O childish minds!

"Forget not that which we found everywhere, From top to bottom of the fatal stair, Above, beneath, around us and within, The weary pageant of immortal sin.

"We have seen woman, stupid slave and proud, Before her own frail, foolish beauty bowed; And man, a greedy, cruel, lascivious fool, Slave of the slave, a ripple in a pool;

"The martyrs groan, the headsman's merry mood; And banquets seasoned and perfumed with blood; Poison, that gives the tyrant's power the slip; And nations amorous of the brutal whip;

"Many religions not unlike our own, All in full flight for heaven's resplendent throne; And Sanctity, seeking delight in pain, Like a sick man of his own sickness vain;

"And mad mortality, drunk with its own power, As foolish now as in a bygone hour, Shouting, in presence of the tortured Christ: 'I curse thee, mine own Image sacrificed.'

"And silly monks in love with Lunacy, Fleeing the troops herded by destiny, Who seek for peace in opiate slumber furled-- Such is the pageant of the rolling world!"