Chapter IV: Story on an Enemy Oppressing a Friend
A person like Sadi who owned a pure heart,A captive became to a smooth-faced one's art.Oppression he bore from the harsh spoken foe ;From Tyranny's club like a ball he would go.He turned not from any one frowning away ;Nor practised rebellion in preference to play.Some one said, "You at least have no honour to show !Of these buffets and load, not an atom you know !"The ignoble, alone, of their bodies take care ;The weak, the affronts of the enemy bear.To wink at the fault of a fool is not right,For they'll say, "You possess neither manhood nor might."How well the demented enthusiast gaveA reply, that in gold it were well to engrave :"My heart's but the house of the love of my friend,And cannot for others, then, hate comprehend."
Words in this poem
- honour n.
- Esteem due or paid to worth; high estimation; respect; consideration; reverence; veneration; manifestation of respect or reverence. [OE. honor, honour, onour, onur, OF. honor, onor, honur, onur, honour, onour, F. honneur, fr. L. honor, honos.]
- demented a.
- Insane; mad; of unsound mind. [From Dement.]
- engrave v. t.
- To deposit in the grave; to bury. [Pref. en- + grave a tomb. Cf. Engrave to carve.]
Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.
About this text
Chapter IV: Story on an Enemy Oppressing a Friend is in the public domain. This text is taken from The Garden of Fragrance: being a complete translation of the Bostan of Sadi from the original Persian into English verse, by G. S. Davie (London: Kegan Paul, Trench and Co., 1882), Internet Archive, the G. S. Davie translation; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.
Cite as: Saadi, Chapter IV: Story on an Enemy Oppressing a Friend, in The Garden of Fragrance (1882), text of Internet Archive, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/saadi-bostan/4-21.html, id L29642.
Form and metre
Chapter IV: Story on an Enemy Oppressing a Friend is 16 lines in a single stanza. It is in rhyming couplets. The metre is anapaestic tetrameter, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 95%).
See other poems in rhyming couplets, other poems in anapaestic tetrameter.
Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.
Rhyme words, stanza by stanza
The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.
- 1 AABBCCBBDDEEFFGG heartA · artA · foeB · goB · awayC · playC · showB · knowB · careD · bearD · rightE · mightE · gaveF · engraveF · friendG · comprehendG
Scansion, line by line
Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against anapaestic tetrameter. How this is done.
| Line | Syl. | Stress |
|---|---|---|
| A person like Sadi who owned a pure heart, | 11 | ·/˘········ |
| A captive became to a smooth-faced one's art. | 11 | ·/˘˘/······ |
| Oppression he bore from the harsh spoken foe ; | 11 | ˘/˘·····/˘· |
| From Tyranny's club like a ball he would go. | 11 | ·/˘˘······· |
| He turned not from any one frowning away ; | 11 | ····/˘·/˘˘/ |
| Nor practised rebellion in preference to play. | 11 | ···˘/˘·/˘·· |
| Some one said, "You at least have no honour to show ! | 12 | ········/˘·· |
| Of these buffets and load, not an atom you know !" | 12 | ··/˘····/˘·· |
| The ignoble, alone, of their bodies take care ; | 12 | ·˘/˘˘/··/˘·· |
| The weak, the affronts of the enemy bear. | 11 | ···˘/··/˘˘· |
| To wink at the fault of a fool is not right, | 11 | ··········· |
| For they'll say, "You possess neither manhood nor might." | 12 | ····˘//˘/··· |
| How well the demented enthusiast gave | 11 | ···˘/˘˘/˘·· |
| A reply, that in gold it were well to engrave : | 12 | ·˘/·······˘/ |
| "My heart's but the house of the love of my friend, | 11 | ··········· |
| And cannot for others, then, hate comprehend." | 11 | ·˘/·/˘···˘/ |
The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.