To the Reader.
One creature only is most foul and false!
Though making no grand gestures, nor great cries,
He willingly would devastate the earth
And in one yawning swallow all the world;
He is Ennui!-with tear-filled eye he dreams
Of scaffolds, as he puffs his water-pipe.
Reader, you know this dainty monster too;
-Hypocrite reader, fellowman,-my twin!
To the Reader, Charles Baudelaire. The Flowers of Evil.
