Verse 26

²¹Seeing them standing there to praise him, Prthu the son of Vena, full of might, laughed and said this in a voice that thundered like a cloud: ²²Bard, herald, gentle praiser: nothing of mine is yet plain in the world. What would this praise of me rest on? Put it elsewhere. Let your words not come out false in me. ²³So later, when you have heard something of me, you whose speech is lovely may make your song then. While there is the telling of the qualities of him whose renown is highest, decent men do not have what is base praised. ²⁴What man able to make great qualities in himself would have singers praise him for what he does not have? Cheated by the thought that they may yet be his, the fool does not see that people are laughing at him.

²⁵Men of power, even when they are famous, shrink from being praised, if they have shame in them and are generous, as they shrink from a deed that deserves blame. ²⁶But bard, we are not known in the world even now by any deeds worth the name. How should we have ourselves sung of, like a child?