“Eat, drink, and sport; the rest of life’s not worth a fillip,” quoth the King;
Methinks the saying saith too much: the swine would say the selfsame thing!

Two-footed beasts that browse through life, by Death to serve as soil design’d,
Bow prone to Earth whereof they be, and there the proper pleasures find:

But you of finer, nobler, stuff, ye, whom to Higher leads the High,
What binds your hearts in common bond with creatures of the stall and sty?

“In certain hope of Life-to-come I journey through this shifting scene”
The Zâhid* snarls and saunters down his Vale of Tears with confi’dent mien.

Wiser than Amrân’s Son* art thou, who ken’st so well the world-to-be,
The Future when the Past is not, the Present merest dreamery;