Page:Works of Voltaire Volume 16.djvu/38

 22 To wed Palmira: No: such splendor ill Would suit my humble state.

Whoe’er thou art, He was not born, I trust, to be thy husband, No, nor thy master; much I err, or thou Springest from a race designed by heaven to check This haughty Arab, and give laws to him Who thus assumes the majesty of kings.

Alas! we know not what it is to boast Of birth or fortune; from our infant years Without or parents, friends, or country, doomed To slavery; here resigned to our hard fate, Strangers to all but to that God we serve, We live content in humble poverty.

And can ye be content? and are ye strangers, Without a father, and without a home? I am a childless, poor, forlorn, old man; You might have been the comfort of my age: To form a plan of future happiness For you, had softened my own wretchedness, And made me some amends for all my wrongs: But you abhor my country and my law.

I am not mistress of myself, and how Can I be thine? I pity thy misfortunes, And bless thee for thy goodness to Palmira; But Mahomet has been a father to me.

A father! ye just gods! the vile impostor!