No More Learning

Come, then! we will from fire to fire wander,
Thou shalt the wooer be and I the pander.
[_To a party who sit round expiring embers_. ]
Old gentlemen, you scarce can hear the fiddle!
You'd gain more praise from me, ensconced there in the middle,
'Mongst that young rousing, tousing set.
One can, at home, enough retirement get.

_General_. Trust not the people's fickle favor!
However much thou mayst for them have done.
Nations, as well as women, ever,
Worship the rising, not the setting sun.

_Minister_. From the right path we've drifted far away,
The good old past my heart engages;
Those were the real golden ages,
When such as we held all the sway.

_Parvenu_. We were no simpletons, I trow,
And often did the thing we should not;
But all is turning topsy-turvy now,
And if we tried to stem the wave, we could not.

_Author_.
Who on the whole will read a work today,
Of moderate sense, with any pleasure?
And as regards the dear young people, they
Pert and precocious are beyond all measure.

_Mephistopheles_ [_who all at once appears very old_].
The race is ripened for the judgment day:
So I, for the last time, climb the witch-mountain, thinking,
And, as my cask runs thick, I say,
The world, too, on its lees is sinking.

_Witch-broker_. Good gentlemen, don't hurry by!
The opportunity's a rare one!
My stock is an uncommon fair one,
Please give it an attentive eye.
There's nothing in my shop, whatever,
But on the earth its mate is found;
That has not proved itself right clever
To deal mankind some fatal wound.
No dagger here, but blood has some time stained it;
No cup, that has not held some hot and poisonous juice,
And stung to death the throat that drained it;
No trinket, but did once a maid seduce;
No sword, but hath some tie of sacred honor riven,
Or haply from behind through foeman's neck been driven.

_Mephistopheles_. You're quite behind the times, I tell you, Aunty!
By-gones be by-gones! done is done!
Get us up something new and jaunty!
For new things now the people run.