The Rāmāyaṇa of Vālmīki 3.28.20

3.28.20

sarvathā tu laghutvaṃ te katthanena vidarśitam
suvarṇapratirūpeṇa tapteneva kuśāgninā

'Thou Das'aratha's son, hast slain
The meaner giants of my train:
And canst thou idly vaunt thy might
And claim the praise not thine by right?
Not thus in self-laudation rave
The truly great, the nobly brave:
No empty boasts like thine disgrace
The foremost of the human race.
The mean of soul, unknown to fame,
Who taint their warrior race with shame,
Thus speak in senseless pride as thou,
O Raghu's son, hast boasted now,
What hero, when the war-dry rings,
Vaunts the high race from which he springs,
Or seeks, when warriors meet and die.
His own descent to glorify?
Weakness and folly show confessed
In every vaunt thou utterest,
As when the flames fed high with grass
Detect the *simulating* brass,
Dost thou note see me standing here
Armed with the mighty mace I rear,
*Firm* as an earth upholding hill
Whose summit veins of metal fill?
Lo, here I stand before thy face
To slay thee with my murderous mace,
As Death, the universal lord,
Stands threatening with his fatal cord.
Enough of this. Much more remains
That should be said: but time constrains.
Ere to his rest the sun descend,
And shades of night the combat end,
The twice seven thousand of my band
Who fell beneath thy bloody hand
Shall have their tears all wiped away
And triumph in thy fall to-day.'