Page:Essays - Abraham Cowley (1886).djvu/127

 that was the main fruit of his sovereignty. I omit the madnesses of Caligula's delights, and the execrable sordidness of those of Tiberius. Would one think that Augustus himself, the highest and most fortunate of mankind, a person endowed too with many excellent parts of nature, should be so hard put to it sometimes for want of recreations, as to be found playing at nuts and bounding-stones with little Syrian and Moorish boys, whose company he took delight in, for their prating and their wantonness? Was it for this, that Rome's best blood he spilt, With so much falsehood, so much guilt? Was it for this that his ambition strove To equal Cæsar first, and after Jove? Greatness is barren sure of solid joys; Her merchandise, I fear, is all in toys; She could not else sure so uncivil be, To treat his universal majesty, His new created Deity, With nuts and bounding-stones and boys. But we must excuse her for this meagre entertainment; she has not really wherewithal to make such feasts as we imagine; her guests must be