Fragment: 'What Men Gain Fairly'.
By Percy Bysshe Shelley
What men gain fairly - that they should possess,
And children may inherit idleness,
From him who earns it - This is understood;
Private injustice may be general good.
But he who gains by base and armed wrong,
Or guilty fraud, or base compliances,
May be despoiled; even as a stolen dress
Is stripped from a convicted thief; and he
Left in the nakedness of infamy.