XXXIV - Happy the maimed, the halt, the mad, the blind —

Happy the maimed, the halt, the mad, the blind —

All who, stamped separate by curtailing birth,

Owe no duty's allegiance to mankind

Nor stand a valuing in their scheme of worth!

But I, whom Fate, not Nature, did curtail,

By no exterior voidness being exempt,

Must bear accusing glances where I fail,

Fixed in the general orbit of contempt.

Fate, less than Nature in being kind to lacking,

Giving the ill, shows not as outer cause,

Making our mock-free will the mirror's backing

Which Fate's own acts as if in itself shows;

      And men, like children, seeing the image there,

      Take place for cause and make our will Fate bear.