Who breaks his birth's invidious bars,

And grasped the skirts of happy chance,

And breasts the blows of circumstance,

And grapples with his evil stars;

Who makes by force his merit known,

And lives to clutch the golden keys

To mould a mighty state's decrees,

And shape the whisper of the throne;

And moving up from high to higher,

Becomes on Fortune's crowning slope