A FORGOTTEN HERO OF THE TROJAN WAR
Thersites only clamour’d in the throng,
Loquacious, loud, and turbulent of tongue:
Awed by no shame, by no respect controll’d,
In scandal busy, in reproaches bold;
With witty malice studious to defame;
Scorn all his joy, and laughter all his aim.
But chief he gloried with licentious style
To lash the great, and monarchs to revile …
Spleen to mankind his envious heart possess’d,
And much he hated all, but most the best.
—Alexander Pope’s
translation of The Iliad