Meter 27

Why should ye harass with wicked hatred

Your spirits weary, as the waves of ocean
Set a-tossing the ice-cold sea,
Urged by the blast ? Why do ye blame,
Your fate reproach that she hath no power?

Why can ye not bide the bitter coming
Of common death by God created
When he is drawing each day towards you?
Can ye not perceive that he is ever pursuing
Each thing begotten, of earthly bearing,
Beasts and birds? Death also is busy
After mankind, all over this earth,
The dreadful huntsman, holding the chase ;
Nor will he truly the trail abandon
Ere that he catch at last the quarry
That he was pursuing. Oh! it is pitiful
That borough-dwellers cannot bide him,
But luckless mortals like the race of birds

Are flying onward fain to meet him,
Or as beasts of the forest that are ever fighting,
Each one seeking to slay the other.
But it is wicked for any wight
That towards another in his inmost temper
He should hatred bear, like bird or beast ;
But most right it were that every mortal
To others should render their due reward,
To all earth-dwellers, whatever they earn
By their life-works. He should love, that is,
All true men most tenderly,
And spare the wicked, as we have said.
The man himself he must love in mind,
And all his vices view with hatred,
And cut them away as best he can.