George Gordon Byron

There is the moral of all human tales:
’Tis but the same rehearsal of the past

For who would trust the seeming sighs
Of wife or paramour?
Fresh feeres will dry the bright blue eyes
We late saw streaming o’er.

...of which the weary breast
Would still, albeit in vain, the heavy heart divest.

There is no god but God! — to prayer — lo! God is great!

Yet, peace be with their ashes, — for by them,
If merited, the penalty is paid;
It is not ours to judge, far less condemn.

Saint Peter sat by the celestial gate:
His keys were rusty, and the lock was dull,
So little trouble had been given of late;
Not that the place by any means was full

Inevitable hour! ’Gainst fate to strive
Where Desolation plants her famished brood
Is vain, or Ilion, Tyre, might yet survive,
And Virtue vanquish all, and Murder cease to thrive.

Wherefore not?
What matters where we fall to fill the maws
Of worms — on battle-plains or listed spot?
Both are but theatres where the chief actors rot.

Terrestrial business filled nought in the sky
Save the Recording Angel's black bureau;
Who found, indeed, the facts to multiply
With such rapidity of vice and woe,
That he had stripped off both his wings in quills,
And yet was in arrear of human ills.

What Angels shrink from: even the very Devil
On this occasion his own work abhorred