109 . Of taking Things easy

TELL me what boots to battle, when the end

Is foreseen failure? What, by heaven, I ask—

By bearded martyrs, and the holy cask

Of papal comfort, what can struggle lend

Of true nobility to those who bend

Constrainèd after all? ’Twere better bask

With resignation and a quiet flask

Than rush to strokes that heaven will surely send.

Methinks the base desire to change our stars

Is but the taint of old mortality,

And as the wavelet curls in every sea

The schoolboy bares his wounds and thinks him Mars.

Give me Petrarca and a pot of tea,

And carry thou thy honourable scars.