Once more he turned to books and sages. He read his Gibbon and Rousseau; Chamfort, Manzoni, Herder’s pages; Madame de Staël, Bichat, Tissot. The sceptic Bayle he quite devoured, The works of Fontenelle he scoured;* He even read some Russians too, Nor did he scorn the odd review— Those journals where each modern Moses Instructs us in a moral way— Where I’m so much abused today, But where such madrigals and roses I used to meet with now and then: E sempre bene, gentlemen. 36 And yet—although his eyes were reading, His thoughts had wandered far apart; Desires, dreams, and sorrows pleading— Had
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