Till they too fade like grass; they crawl Like shadows forth in spring.

They see the merchants

On the Oxus stream;-but care

Must visit first them too, and make them pale.

Whether, through whirling sand,

A cloud of desert robber-horse have burst

Upon their caravan; or greedy kings,
In the wall'd cities the way passes
through,

Crush'd them with tolls; or fever-airs,
On some great river's marge,
Mown them down, far from home.

They see the Heroes

Near harbor;-but they share

Their lives, and former violent toil in Thebes,

Seven-gated Thebes, or Troy ;

Or where the echoing oars

Of Argo first

Startled the unknown sea.

Wordsworth has gone from us—and ye,
Ah, may ye feel his voice as we!
He too upon a wintry clime
Had fallen-on this iron time

Of doubts, disputes, distractions, fears.
He found us when the age had bound
Our souls in its benumbing round;
He spoke, and loosed our heart in tears.
He laid us as we lay at birth
On the cool flowery lap of earth,
Smiles broke from us and we had ease;
The hills were round us, and the breeze
Went o'er the sun-lit fields again;
Our foreheads felt the wind and rain.
Our youth returned; for there was shed
On spirits that had long been dead,
Spirits dried up and closely furl'd,
The freshness of the early world.

Ah! since dark days still bring to light
Man's prudence and man's fiery might,
Time may restore us in his course

Goethe's sage mind and Byron's force;
But where will Europe's latter hour
Again find Wordsworth's healing
power?

Others will teach us how to dare,
And against fear our breast to steel;
Others will strengthen us to bear-
But who, ah! who, will make us feel?
The cloud of mortal destiny,
Others will front it fearlessly-
But who, like him, will put it by?

Keep fresh the grass upon his grave
O Rotha, with thy living wave!
Sing him thy best! for few or none
Hears thy voice right, now he is gone.
1850.

SELF-DECEPTION

Then, as now, a Power beyond our seeing,

Staved us back, and gave our choice the law.

Ah, whose hand that day through Heaven guided

Man's new spirit, since it was not we? Ah, who swayed our choice and who decided

What our gifts, and what our wants should be?

For, alas! he left us each retaining Shreds of gifts which he refused in full. Still these waste us with their hopeless straining,

Still the attempt to use them proves them null.

And on earth we wander, groping, reeling;

Powers stir in us, stir and disappear. Ah! and he, who placed our masterfeeling.

Fail'd to place that master-feeling clear.

THE SECOND BEST

MODERATE tasks and moderate leisure,
Quiet living, strict-kept measure
Both in suffering and in pleasure-
'Tis for this thy nature yearns.

But so many books thou readest,
But so many schemes thou breedest,
But so many wishes feedest.

That thy poor head almost turns.
And (the world 's so madly jangled,
Human things so fast entangled)
Nature's wish must now be strangled
For that best which she discerns.
So it must be! yet, while leading
A strain'd life, while overfeeding,
Like the rest, his wit with reading,
No small profit that man earns,
Who through all he meets can steer him,
Can reject what cannot clear him,
Cling to what can truly cheer him ;

Who each day more surely learns

THE Out-spread world to span
A cord the Gods first slung,
And then the soul of man
There, like a mirror, hung,

And bade the winds through space impel the gusty toy.

Hither and thither spins

The wind-borne, mirroring soul,
A thousand glimpses wins,
And never sees a whole;

Looks once, and drives elsewhere, and leaves its last employ.

The Gods laugh in their sleeve
To watch man doubt and fear
Who knows not what to believe
Since he sees nothing clear,

And dares stamp nothing false where he finds nothing sure.

Is this, Pausanias, so?

And can our souls not strive,
But with the winds must go,
And hurry where they drive?

Is fate indeed so strong, man's strength indeed so poor?

I will not judge. That man,
Howbeit, I judge as lost,
Whose mind allows a plan,
Which would degrade it most;

And he treats doubt the best who tries to see least ill.

Be not, then, fear's blind slave! Thou art my friend; to thee,

All knowledge that I have, All skill I wield, are free.

Ask not the latest news of the last miracle,

Ask not what days and nights
In trance Pantheia lay,

But ask how thou such sights
May'st see without dismay;

Ask what most helps when known, thou son of Anchitus!

What? hate, and awe, and shame Fill thee to see our time;

Thou feelest thy soul's frame

Shaken and out of chime?

What? life and chance go hard with thee too, as with us;

Thy citizens, 'tis said,
Envy thee and oppress,
Thy goodness no men aid,
All strive to make it less;

Tyranny, pride, and lust, fill Sicily's abodes;

Heaven is with earth at strife,
Signs make thy soul afraid,
The dead return to life,

Rivers are dried, winds stay'd;

Scarce can one think in calm, so threatening are the Gods;

And we feel, day and night,
The burden of ourselves-
Well, then, the wiser wight
In his own bosom delves,

And asks what ails him so, and gets what cure he can.

The sophist sneers: Fool, take
Thy pleasure, right or wrong.
The pious wail: Forsake

A world these sophists throng. Be neither saint nor sophist-led, but be a man!

These hundred doctors try

To preach thee to their school.
We have the truth! they cry ;
And yet their oracle,

Trumpet it as they will, is but the same as thine.

Once read thy own breast right,
And thou hast done with fears;
Man gets no other light,
Search he a thousand years.

Sink in thyself! there ask what ails thee, at that shrine !

What makes thee struggle and rave?
Why are men ill at ease?—

'Tis that the lot they have

Fails their own will to please ;

For man would make no murmuring, were his will obey'd.

And why is it, that still

Man with his lot thus fights?

"Tis that he makes this will

The measure of his rights,

And believes Nature outraged if his will's gainsaid.

Couldst thou, Pausanias, learn
How deep a fault is this;
Couldst thou but once discern
Thou hast no right to bliss,

No title from the Gods to welfare and repose;

Then thou wouldst look less mazed
Whene'er of bliss debarr'd,

Nor think the Gods were crazed
When thy own lot went hard.
But we are all the same-the fools of our
own woes!

For, from the first faint morn
Of life, the thirst for bliss
Deep in man's heart is born;
And, sceptic as he is,

He fails not to judge clear if this be quench'd or no.

Nor is the thirst to blame.
Man errs not that he deems
His welfare his true aim,
He errs because he dreams

The world does but exist that welfare to bestow.

We mortals are no kings

For each of whom to sway

A new-made world up-springs,
Meant merely for his play;

No, we are strangers here; the world is from of old.

In vain our pent wills fret,
And would the world subdue.
Limits we did not set

Condition all we do;

Born into life we are, and life must be our mould.

Born into life !-man grows
Forth from his parents' stem,
And blends their bloods, as those
Of theirs are blent in them;

So each new man strikes root into a far fore-time.

Born into life!—we bring

A bias with us here,

And, when here, each new thing
Affects us we come near;

To tunes we did not call our being must keep chime.

Born into life!—in vain,

Opinions, those or these, Unalter'd to retain

The obstinate mind decrees; Experience, like a sea, soaks all-effacing in.

Born into life!-who lists May what is false hold dear, And for himself make mists Through which to see less clear; The world is what it is, for all our dust and din.

Born into life!-'tis we,

And not the world, are new; Our cry for bliss, our plea, Others have urged it tooOur wants have all been felt, our errors made before.

No eye could be too sound
To observe a world so vast,
No patience too profound
To sort what's here amass'd;

How man may here best live no care too great to explore.

But we as some rude guest Would change, where'er he roam, The manners there profess'd To those he brings from homeWe mark not the world's course, but would have it take ours.

The world's course proves the terms
On which man wins content;
Reason the proof confirms-
We spurn it, and invent

A false course for the world, and for ourselves, false powers.

Riches we wish to get,

Yet remain spendthrifts still;
We would have health, and yet
Still use our bodies ill;

Bafflers of our own prayers, from youth to life's last scenes.

We would have inward peace,
Yet will not look within;
We would have misery cease,
Yet will not cease from sin;

We want all pleasant ends, but will use no harsh means;

We do not what we ought, What we ought not, we do, And lean upon the thought That chance will bring us through; But our own acts, for good or ill, are mightier powers.

Yet, even when man forsakes

All sin,-is just, is pure,
Abandons all which makes
His welfare insecure,-

Other existences there are, that clash with ours.

Like us, the lightning-fires
Love to have scope and play;
The stream, like us, desires
An unimpeded way:

Like us, the Libyan wind delights to roam at large.

Streams will not curb their pride
The just man not to entomb,
Nor lightnings go aside

To give his virtues room;

Nor is that wind less rough which blows a good man's barge.

Nature, with equal mind,
Sees all her sons at play;
Sees man control the wind,
The wind sweep man away;

Allows the proudly-riding and the foundering bark.

And, lastly, though of ours
No weakness spoil our lot,
Though the non-human powers
Of Nature harm us not,

The ill deeds of other men make often our life dark.

What were the wise man's plan?—
Through this sharp, toil-set life,
To work as best he can,

And win what's won by strife.But we an easier way to cheat our pains have found.

Scratch'd by a fall, with moans
As children of weak age
Lend life to the dumb stones
Whereon to vent their rage,

And bend their little fists, and rate the senseless ground;

So, loath to suffer mute,
We, peopling the void air,
Make Gods to whom to impute
The ills we ought to bear;

With God and Fate to rail at, suffering easily.

Yet grant-as sense long miss'd
Things that are now perceived,
And much may still exist

Which is not yet believed

Grant that the world were full of Gods we cannot see ;

All things the world which fill
Of but one stuff are spun,
That we who rail are still,
With what we rail at, one;

One with the o'erlabored Power that through the breadth and length

Of earth, and air, and sea,

In men, and plants, and stones,
Hath toil perpetually,

And travails, pants, and moans; Fain would do all things well, but sometimes fails in strength.

And patiently exact
This universal God
Alike to any act
Proceeds at any nod,

And quietly declaims the cursings of himself.

This is not what man hates,
Yet he can curse but this,
Harsh Gods and hostile Fates
Are dreams! this only is

Is everywhere; sustains the wise, the foolish elf.

Not only, in the intent

To attach blame elsewhere,

Do we at will invent

Stern Powers who make their care To embitter human life, malignant Deities;

But, next, we would reverse

The scheme ourselves have spun,
And what we made to curse
We now would lean upon,

And feign kind Gods who perfect what man vainly tries.

Look, the world tempts our eye,
And we would know it all!
We map the starry sky,

We mine this earthen ball,

We measure the sea-tides, we number the sea-sands;

We scrutinise the dates Of long-past human things, The bounds of effaced states, The lines of deceased kings; We search out dead men's words, and works of dead men's hands;