Julius Caesar, Charlemagne, and Napoleon have one thing in common

— they were unable to outlast the empires they forged. Though they garbed themselves in symbols meant to represent the eternal, eventually they went to the grave like the rest of mankind. Shelley encapsulates this motif in “Ozymandias,” written from the perspective of a man speaking with a traveler who had just visited the former empire of the great Ozymandias. Although the dead ruler’s statues and memorials remain, they are dilapidated and gather dust, a symbol of the passage of time that dooms any who dreams of building empires. Shelley’s classic work is a morality tale, a check on hubris, a reminder that no matter how great our works, they will all ultimately decay as the wheel of history turns round.