[to Chilperic]
Sire, you are weary, yet we crave the grace
Of a brief audience.
CHILPERIC.
Business! I can brook
No more of these distractions. Your good brother
Relieves me of all business. I can hear
Scarcely the people’s clamour when they shout,
And I am shy at facing them. To know
There is a god indifferent to its whims
Gives the world courage of its natural awe;
So I expose these curls; that duty done,
Leave me at ease, an idol in his niche.
PEPIN.
But, sire, my brother has persuaded me,
If you consent, to take on me his burthens,
His duties and his honours; being summoned,
He holds, by God to a monastic life.
CHILPERIC.
[with passing animation]
This interests us. After so brief a term
Of dignity! But I applaud his sense:
The convent is a place for peace of mind;
One has no interruption, one may watch
The gold-fish in the fountain half a day,
If so one will; and, though the prayers are long,
One grows accustomed to them as to meals
And looks for their recurrence.
[suspiciously] But, my Consul,
With you it cannot be the luxury
Of doing nothing that attracts. For us
It is the happy and predestined lot;
But for an untamed youth whose pleasures still
Are running in the current of his blood,
Such choice is of ill-omen.
CARLOMAN.
Courage, sire,
Is constant industry for happiness.
When I become a monk——