Page:The collected works of Henrik Ibsen (Volume 4).djvu/169

 glasses with him].
 * How strengthening it is to hear
 * a principle thus acted out,
 * freed from the night of theory,
 * unshaken by the outward ferment!

PEER [who has been drinking freely during the preceding passages]
 * We Northland men know how to carry
 * our battle through! The key to the art
 * of life's affairs is simply this:
 * to keep one's ear close shut against
 * the ingress of one dangerous viper.

MR. COTTON
 * What sort of viper, pray, dear friend?

PEER
 * A little one that slyly wiles you
 * to tempt the irretrievable.
 * [Drinking again.]
 * The essence of the art of daring,
 * the art of bravery in act,
 * is this: To stand with choice-free foot
 * amid the treacherous snares of life,-
 * to know for sure that other days
 * remain beyond the day of battle,-
 * to know that ever in the rear
 * a bridge for your retreat stands open.
 * This theory has borne me on,
 * has given my whole career its colour;
 * and this same theory I inherit,
 * a race-gift, from my childhood's home.

MONSIEUR BALL