Gyges (rising).
But him it smote like the heaven’s thundery burst;
He felt that he had been until that hour
A shade of Erebus, cold, thinly-passioned,
A mere estray among the Things of Life
Quicked now with its first blood even as themselves.
He felt that all their laughing, all their weeping,
Their joying and their sighing—yea, their breathing
He had but aped nor ever dreamt wherefore
The breast of man forever swells and sinks.