Cowardice.
Alone, the coward is his shadow's slave:
Spectators make the vain enact the brave.
Criticism.
Truth, taste, and learning, twine the living three,
And thou, O critic, shalt my Hermes be.
Delusion.
For seven years only will this world be seen,
Says one; but hires a mansion for fourteen.
Detraction.
Like a bad habit oft this vice prevails,
Some nibble characters as some their nails.
Difference in judging Others.
The bad condemn with savagery and sneer,
The good arraign in sorrow and in fear.
Dreams.
Sleep hath drugged Reason; Fancy Memory weds;
Lo, the wild offspring with a hundred heads.
Duty to God.
What frenzy dreams of an unpunctual sun?
Lord, as in Heaven, on Earth Thy Will be done.
Earth.
To him who sets on earth his only care,
Life is idolatry, and Death despair.
Elevated Nonentity.
Through all these years attendance thus to dance,
To gain a public insignificance!
Enthusiasts.
But for such flight, although it frantic seems,
Spirits would crawl; no mean without extremes.