My princess!—to have known heaven’s gifted ones
Is to have gather’d into the full soul
Inalienable wealth!
Prin. Oh, precious things!
The richly graced, the exquisite, are things
To fear, to love with trembling! Beautiful
Is the pure flame when on thy hearth it shines,
When in the friendly torch it gives thee light,
How gracious and how calm!—but, once unchain’d,
Lo! ruin sweeps along its fatal path!