Не Богу ты служил и не России,
You had been serving neither God nor Russia,
Служил лишь суете своей,
But only your permissive bustle,
И все дела твои, и добрые и злые, —
And all your deeds life-long, including good and bad ones, -
Все было ложь в тебе, все призраки пустые:
All they were lies in you, all they were empty phantoms:
Ты был не царь, а лицедей.
You were not monarch but the mask.
1855 год