The simple dupe, and the crafty knave: the murderer, and—his victim!
Yet all are in many characters; the best stand guilty at the bar;
And he that seemed the worst may have most of real excuse.
The talents unto which a man is born, be they few or many,
Are dropped into the balance of account, working unlooked-for changes;
And perchance the convict from the galleys may stand above the hermit in his cell,
For that, the obstacles in one outweigh the propensions in the other.
There be, who have made themselves friends, yea, by unrighteous mammon,—
Friends, ready waiting as an escort to those everlasting habitations;
Embodied in living witnesses, thronging to meet them in a cloud,