Here may be seen, in bloodless pomp arrayed,
The paste-board triumph and the cavalcade, 150
Processions formed for piety and love,
A mistress or a saint in every grove.
By sports like these are all their cares beguiled;
The sports of children satisfy the child.
Each nobler aim, repressed by long control, 155
Now sinks at last, or feebly mans the soul;
While low delights, succeeding fast behind,
In happier meanness occupy the mind:
As in those domes where Caesars[22] once bore sway,
Defaced by time and tottering in decay, 160
There in the ruin, heedless of the dead,
The shelter-seeking peasant builds his shed;
And, wond'ring man could want the larger pile,
Exults, and owns his cottage with a smile.
My soul, turn from them, turn we to survey, 165
Where rougher climes a nobler race display;
Where the bleak Swiss their stormy mansions tread,
And force a churlish soil[23] for scanty bread.
No product here the barren hills afford,
But man and steel, the soldier and his sword:[24] 170
No vernal blooms their torpid rocks array,
But winter ling'ring chills the lap of May:
No Zephyr fondly sues the mountain's breast,
But meteors glare, and stormy glooms invest.
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