  To suffer hardness with good cheer, In sternest school of warfare bred, Our youth should learn; let steed and spear Make him one day the Parthian's dread; Cold skies, keen perils, brace his life. Methinks I see from rampired town Some battling tyrant's matron wife, Some maiden, look in terror down,— "Ah, my dear lord, untrain'd in war! O tempt not the infuriate mood Of that fell lion! see! from far He plunges through a tide of blood!" What joy, for fatherland to die! Death's darts e'en flying feet o'ertake, Nor spare a recreant chivalry, A back that cowers, or loins that quake. True Virtue never knows defeat: HER robes she keeps unsullied still, Nor takes, nor quits, HER curule seat To please a people's veering will. True Virtue opens heaven to worth: She makes the way she does not find: The vulgar crowd, the humid earth, Her soaring pinion leaves behind. Seal'd lips have blessings sure to come: Who drags Eleusis' rite to day, That man shall never share my home, Or join my voyage: roofs give way And boats are wreck'd: true men and thieves Neglected Justice oft confounds: Though Vengeance halt, she seldom leaves The wretch whose flying steps she hounds.
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