CXXIV.

We wither from our youth, we gasp awaySick-sick; unfound the boon-unslaked the thi Though to the last, in verge of our decay, Some phantom lures, such as we sought at firstBut all too late,-so are we doubly curst. Love, fame, ambition, avarice-'tis the same, Each idle-and all ill-and none the worstFor all are meteors with a different name, And Death the sable smoke where vanishes the fla

CXXV.

Few-none-find what they love or could have lov
Though accident, blind contact, and the strong
Necessity of loving, have removed

Antipathies-but to recur, ere long,
Envenom'd with irrevocable wrong;
And Circumstance, that unspiritual god
And miscreator, makes and helps along
Our coming evils with a crutch-like rod,

Whose touch turns Hope to dust,—the dust we all h trod.

CXXVI.

Our life is a false nature-'tis not in

The harmony of things,-this hard decree,
This uneradicable taint of sin,

This boundless upas, this all-blasting tree,

Whose root is earth, whose leaves and branches be The skies which rain their plagues on men like dew— Disease, death, bondage-all the woes we seeAnd worse, the woes we see not-which throb through The immedicable soul, with heart-aches ever new.

CXXVII.

Yet let us ponder boldly-'tis a base (57)
Abandonment of reason to resign

Our right of thought-our last and only place
Of refuge; this, at least, shall still be mine:
Though from our birth the faculty divine

Is chain'd and tortured-cabin'd, cribb'd, confined,
And bred in darkness, lest the truth should shine
Too brightly on the unprepared mind,

The beam pours in, for time and skill will couch the blind.

CANTO IV.

PILGRIMAGE.

151

CXXVIII.

Arches on arches! as it were that Rome,
Collecting the chief trophies of her line,
Would build up all her triumphs in one dome,
Her Coliseum stands; the moonbeams shine
As 'twere its natural torches, for divine

Should be the light which streams here, to illume
This long-explored but still exhaustless mine
Of contemplation; and the azure gloom
Of an Italian night, where the deep skies assume

CXXIX.

Hues which have words, and speak to ye of heaven,
Floats o'er this vast and wondrous monument,
And shadows forth its glory. There is given
Unto the things of earth, which Time hath bent,
A spirit's feeling, and where he hath leant
His hand, but broke his scythe, there is a power
And magic in the ruin'd battlement,

For which the palace of the present hour

Must yield its pomp, and wait till ages are its dower.

CXXX.

Oh Time! the beautifier of the dead,
Adorner of the ruin, comforter

And only healer when the heart hath bled—
Time! the corrector where our judgments err,
The test of truth, love,-sole philosopher,
For all beside are sophists, from thy thrift,
Which never loses though it doth defer-
Time, the avenger! unto thee I lift

My hands, and eyes, and heart, and crave of thee a

gift:

CXXXI.

Amidst this wreck, where thou hast made a shrine

And temple more divinely desolate,

Among thy mightier offerings here are mine,

Ruins of years-though few, yet full of fate :-
If thou hast ever seen me too elate,

Hear me not; but if calmly I have borne

Good, and reserved my pride against the hate Which shall not whelm me, let me not have worn This iron in my soul in vain-shall they not mourn?