The Critic righteously to justice haled,
His own ear to the post securely nailed--
What most he dreads unable to inflict,
And powerless to hawk the faults he's picked?
The liar choked upon his choicest lie,
And impotent alike to villify
Or flatter for the gold of thrifty men
Who hate his person but employ his pen--
Who love and loathe, respectively, the dirt
Belonging to his character and shirt?

What! "Out of danger?"--Nature's minions all,
Like hounds returning to the huntsman's call,
Obedient to the unwelcome note
That stays them from the quarry's bursting throat?--
Famine and Pestilence and Earthquake dire,
Torrent and Tempest, Lightning, Frost and Fire,
The soulless Tiger and the mindless Snake,
The noxious Insect from the stagnant lake
(Automaton malevolences wrought
Out of the substance of Creative Thought)--
These from their immemorial prey restrained,
Their fury baffled and their power chained?

I'm safe? Is that what the physician said?
What! "Out of danger?" Then, by Heaven, I'm dead!