FROM “SORDELLO”—BOOK ONE.

... To remove

A curse that haunts such natures—to preclude

Their finding out themselves can work no good

To what they love nor make it very blest

By their endeavor.—they are fain invest

The lifeless thing with life from their own soul

Availing it to purpose, to control,

To dwell distinct and have peculiar joy

And separate interests that may employ

That beauty fitly, for its proper sake.

This world of ours by tacit pact is pledged

To laying such a spangled fabric low,

Whether by gradual brush or gallant blow.

But its abundant will was balked here: doubt

Rose tardily in one so fenced about

From most that nurtures judgment, care and pain:

Judgment, that dull expedient we are fain,

Less favored, to adopt betimes and force

Stead us, diverted from our natural course

Of joys—contrive some yet amid the dearth,

Vary and render them, it may be, worth

Most we forgo.

The Fall of Ulysses: An Elephant Story · 第 5 / 8 题