glimpse of the terrible head of Medusa they whitened into marble. And Perseus thrust the head back into his wallet, and went to tell his dear mother that she need no longer be afraid of the wicked King Polydectes. PROMETHEUS. BY LORD BYRON. [LORD GEORGE NOEL GORDON BYRON: A famous English poet; born in London, January 22, 1788. At the age of ten he succeeded to the estate and title of his granduncle William, fifth Lord Byron. He was educated at Harrow and Cambridge, and in 1807 published his first volume of poems, "Hours of Idleness." After a tour through eastern Europe he brought out two cantos of "Childe Harold," which met with instantaneous success, and soon after he married the heiress Miss Millbanke. The union proving unfortunate, Byron left England, and passed several years in Italy. In 1823 he joined the Greek insurgents in Cephalonia, and later at Missolonghi, where he died of a fever April 19, 1824. His chief poetical works are: "Childe Harold," "Don Juan," 66 Manfred," "Cain," "Marino Faliero," " Sardanapalus," "The Giaour," "Bride of Abydos," "The Corsair," "Lara," and "Mazeppa."] I. TITAN! to whose immortal eyes The sufferings of mortality, Seen in their sad reality, Were not as things that gods despise; The agony they do not show, Which speaks but in its loneliness, And then is jealous lest the sky II. Titan! to thee the strife was given Between the suffering and the will, Which torture where they cannot ki; And the inexorable Heaven, And the deaf tyranny of Fate, The ruling principle of Hate, Refused thee even the boon to die: The wretched gift eternity Was thine-and thou hast borne it well. The fate thou didst so well foresee, That in his hand the lightnings trembled. III. Thy Godlike crime was to be kind, Still in thy patient energy, In the endurance, and repulse Of thine impenetrable Spirit, Which Earth and Heaven could not convulse, A mighty lesson we inherit: Thou art a symbol and a sign To Mortals of their fate and force; Like thee, Man is in part divine, A troubled stream from a pure source; His wretchedness, and his resistance, To which his Spirit may oppose Itself and equal to all woes, And a firm will, and a deep sense Which even in torture can descry Its own concentered recompense, Triumphant where it dares defy, And making Death a Victory. |