A vale of tears, a wilderness of woe,
A sad unmeaning mystery of strife;
Reason with Passion strives, and Feeling ever
Battles with Conscience, clear-eyed arbiter.
Thus spake I in sad mood not long ago,
To my dear father, of this human life,
Its jars and phantasies. Soft answered he,
With soul of love strong as a mountain river:
We make ourselves--Son, you are what you are
Neither by fate nor providence nor cause
External: all unformed humanity
Waiteth the stamp of individual laws;
And as you love and act, the plastic spirit
Doth the impression evermore inherit.
X
Last Autumn we were four, and travelled far
With Phœbe in her golden plenilune,
O’er stubble-fields where sheaves of harvest boon
Stood slanted. Many a clear and stedfast star
Twinkled its radiance thro’ crisp-leaved beeches,
Over the farm to which, with snatches rare
Of ancient ballads, songs and saucy speeches,
We hurried, happy mad. Then each had there
A dove-eyed sister pining for him, four
Fair ladies legacied with loveliness,
Chaste as a group of stars, or lilies blown
In rural nunnery. O God! Thy sore
Strange ways expound. Two to the grave have gone
Without apparent reason more or less.