Chapter LXXXVII

But, life compounds the dregs to luscious draughts;
And various pleasure mocks monotonous woe;
And all the wheels and hinges show their crafts,
Leaving no room for the full spirit’s flow;
Even love forbids the soul, for human loss,
To wear less brightly, its heaven-tinctur’d fire,
And shows it lovelier, to exalt the cross
Into the pledge of love, still struggling higher:
Only the eternal breath of Nature’s beauty
Demands the unchanged devotion of our years.
Immortal constancy of shifting duty
Crowns the rich harvest of our sometime tears:
What’s spent in loving, richly is defrayed,
Though nought’s returned, by lending we are paid.

LXXXVIII.

But, man, the fitful birth of Time and Change,
Demands the substance of a living love:
Nor, ever satisfied, must onward range,
And builds for earth the idea, or above:
His heart must find a home, where’er it goes;
He nestles in the warmth, then dreams ’tis cold;
Each imperfection lives, and livelier shows;
Love learns despair, and, at the last, is cold:
And, but one path, secure, leads ever round,
Nor dares attempt the warmth, for which it glows;
And who would trifle in this shallow sound
Escapes the test, fenced round by summer snows.
Whose quiet peace can amble o’er this road,
Lives, like what sage? nor fears love’s ardent goad.