now, and cease to let thy heart consume away with fretfulness, nor expect to live on thine own terms in a realm that is common to all.' SONG II. MAN'S COVETOUSNESS. What though Plenty pour her gifts With a lavish hand, Numberless as are the stars, Countless as the sand, Will the race of man, content, Cease to murmur and lament? Nay, though God, all-bounteous, give Gold at man's desire-- Honours, rank, and fame--content Not a whit is nigher; But an all-devouring greed Yawns with ever-widening need. Then what bounds can e'er restrain This wild lust of having, When with each new bounty fed Grows the frantic craving? He is never rich whose fear Sees grim Want forever near. III. 'If Fortune should plead thus against thee, assuredly thou wouldst not have one word to offer in reply; or, if thou canst find any justification of thy complainings, thou must show what it is. I will give thee space to speak.' Then said I: 'Verily, thy pleas are plausible--yea, steeped in the honeyed sweetness of music and rhetoric. But their charm lasts only while they are sounding in the ear; the sense of his misfortunes lies deeper in the heart of the wretched. So, when the sound ceases to vibrate upon the air, the heart's indwelling sorrow is felt with renewed bitterness.' Then said she: 'It is indeed as thou sayest, for we have not yet come to the curing of thy sickness; as yet these are but lenitives conducing to the treatment of a malady hitherto obstinate. The remedies which go deep I will apply in due season. Nevertheless, to deprecate thy determination to be thought wretched, I ask thee, Hast thou forgotten the extent and bounds of thy felicity? I say nothing of how, when orphaned and desolate, thou wast taken into the care of illustrious men; how thou wast chosen for alliance with the highest in the state--and even before thou wert bound to their house by marriage, wert already dear to their love--which is the most precious of all ties. Did not all pronounce thee most happy in the virtues of thy wife, the splendid honours of her father, and the blessing of male issue? I pass over--for I care not to speak of blessings in which others also have shared--the distinctions often denied to age which thou enjoyedst in thy youth. I choose rather to come to the unparalleled culmination of thy good fortune. If the fruition of any earthly success has weight in the scale of happiness, can the memory of that splendour be swept away by any rising flood of troubles? That day when thou didst see thy two sons ride forth from home joint consuls, followed by a train of senators, and welcomed by the good-will of the people; when these two sat in curule chairs in the Senate-house, and thou by thy panegyric on the king didst earn the fame of eloquence and ability; when in the Circus, seated between the two consuls, thou didst glut the multitude thronging around