Eugene Oneguine [Onegin]. A Romance of Russian Life in Verse

Ye miracles of courtly grace, He left you first, and I must own The manners of the highest class Have latterly vexatious grown;And though perchance a lady may Discourse of Bentham or of Say, Yet as a rule their talk I call Harmless, but quite nonsensical.Then they're so innocent of vice, So full of piety, correct, So prudent, and so circumspect Stately, devoid of prejudice, So inaccessible to men, Their looks alone produce the spleen.[17]

XXXVII

And you, my youthful damsels fair, Whom latterly one often meets Urging your droshkies swift as air Along Saint Petersburg's paved streets, From you too Eugene took to flight, Abandoning insane delight, And isolated from all men, Yawning betook him to a pen.He thought to write, but labour long Inspired him with disgust and so Nought from his pen did ever flow, And thus he never fell among That vicious set whom I don't blame— Because a member I became.

XXXVIII

Once more to idleness consigned, He felt the laudable desire From mere vacuity of mind The wit of others to acquire.A case of books he doth obtain— He reads at random, reads in vain.This nonsense, that dishonest seems, This wicked, that absurd he deems, All are constrained and fetters bear, Antiquity no pleasure gave, The moderns of the ancients rave— Books he abandoned like the fair, His book-shelf instantly doth drape With taffety instead of crape.

XXXIX

Having abjured the haunts of men, Like him renouncing vanity, His friendship I acquired just then; His character attracted me.An innate love of meditation, Original imagination, And cool sagacious mind he had: I was incensed and he was sad.Both were of passion satiate And both of dull existence tired, Extinct the flame which once had fired; Both were expectant of the hate With which blind Fortune oft betrays The very morning of our days.

XL

He who hath lived and living, thinks, Must e'en despise his kind at last; He who hath suffered ofttimes shrinks From shades of the relentless past.No fond illusions live to soothe, But memory like a serpent's tooth With late repentance gnaws and stings.All this in many cases brings A charm with it in conversation. Oneguine's speeches I abhorred At first, but soon became inured To the sarcastic observation, To witticisms and taunts half-vicious And gloomy epigrams malicious.

XLI