condescension! When the power of the great turns not to insolence
but to beneficence, we feel that Fortune has bestowed her gifts
aright. Here alone Envy has no place. For how should one man grudge
another his prosperity when he sees him using it with moderation,
not, like the Homeric Ate, an oppressor of the weak, trampling on
men's necks? It is otherwise with those meaner souls--victims of
their own ignoble vanity--, who, when Fortune has raised them
suddenly beyond their hopes into her winged aerial car, know no
rest, can never look behind them, but must ever press upwards. To
such the end soon comes: Icarus-like, with melted wax and moulting
feathers, they fall headlong into the billows, a derision to
mankind. The Daedaluses use their waxen wings with moderation: they
are but men; they husband their strength accordingly, and are
content to fly a little higher than the waves,--so little that the
sun never finds them dry; and that prudence is their salvation.

Therein lies this lady's highest praise. She has her reward: all
men pray that her wings may never droop, and that blessings may
increase upon her.

_Ly_. And may the prayer be granted! She deserves every
blessing: she is not outwardly fair alone, like Helen, but has a
soul within more fair, more lovely than her body. It is a fitting
crown to the happiness of our benevolent and gracious Emperor, that
in his day such a woman should be born; should be his, and her
affections his. It is blessedness indeed, to possess one of whom we
may say with Homer that she contends with golden Aphrodite in
beauty, and in works is the equal of Athene. Who of womankind shall
be compared to her