ough tyrant kings or tyrant laws restrain,
How small, of all that human hearts endure,
That part which laws or kings can cause or cure; 430
Still to ourselves in every place consigned,
Our own felicity we make or find:
With secret course, which no loud storms annoy,
Glides the smooth current of domestic joy.
The lifted ax, the agonizing wheel, 435
Luke's iron crown,[52] and Damiens' bed of steel,[53]
To men remote from power but rarely known,
Leave reason, faith, and conscience all our own.

NOTE.--Although many of the poet's statements are greatly exaggerated,
_The Traveller_ is interesting because it contains beautiful
descriptions and apt expressions of thought. The verse employed is the
heroic couplet, the favorite verse of the eighteenth-century poets.
The lines rhyme in pairs, and often a couplet expresses a complete
thought. Each line contains five feet, or measures.

[1.] Scheld. The Schelde, or Scheldt, empties into the North Sea near
Antwerp.

[2.] Carinthian boor. Carinthia is a province of Austria.

[3.] Campania's plain. Campania includes, among other districts, the
province of Naples.

[4.] My brother. Probably the poet alludes to his elder brother,
Henry, who lived in Ireland. To him he is said to have sent the first
part of his poem, from Switzerland.

[5.] Let school-taught pride, etc. _i.e._ let the philosopher pretend,
if he will, that material things are of small importance.

[6.] Swains, a name used by poets for young men living in the country,
especially lovers.

[7.] The line, the equinoctial line, the equator.

[8.] Idra's cliffs. Idria is a town among the mountains in Camiola,
Austria. Near it are mines of quicksilver.

[9.] Arno's shelvy side. _Shelvy_, or _shelving_, means _sloping
gradually_. Florence is on the Arno.

[10.] Either seems, etc. _Either_ properly signifies _one of two_; it
has occasionally been used for _one of several_, as Goldsmith uses it
here.

[11.] And honor sinks, etc., a sentiment common in the poet's day, but
entertained by few persons in these times. Formerly, in many European
countries, trade, even on a large scale, was considered belittling. A
gentleman's son might enter the Church, the army, or the navy, but he
must not become a merchant.

[12.] My proper cares, my own, my personal cares.

[13.] Gelid, cold.

[14.] To winnow, to fan.

[15.] Sensual bliss is all the nation knows.