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.

Things that are now perceived,

And much may still exist

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'er-labored Power that through the

breadth and length

Of earth, and air, and sea,

In men, and plants, and stones,

Hath toil perpetually,

And struggles, 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.

Nor only, in the intent

To attach blame elsewhere,

Do we at will invent

Stern Powers who make their care To imbitter 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 scrutinize 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;

We shut our eyes, and muse

How our own minds are made,

What springs of thought they use,

How rightened, how betrayed;

And spend our wit to name what most employ unnamed;

But still, as we proceed,

The mass swells more and more

Of volumes yet to read,

Of secrets yet to explore.

Our hair grows gray, our eyes are dimmed, our heat is

tamed.

We rest our faculties,

And thus address the Gods :

"True science if there is,

It stays in your abodes;

Man's measures cannot mete the immeasurable All;

"You only can take in

The world's immense design,
Our desperate search was sin,

Which henceforth we resign,

Sure only that your mind sees all things which befall!"

Fools! that in man's brief term

He cannot all things view,

Affords no ground to affirm

That there are Gods who do!

Nor does being weary prove that he has where to rest!

Again: our youthful blood
Claims rapture as its right;
The world, a rolling flood

Of newness and delight,

Draws in the enamored gazer to its shining breast;

Gives flowers after flowers,

With passionate warmth we clasp

Hand after hand in ours;

Nor do we soon perceive how fast our youth is spent.

At once our eyes grow clear;

We see in blank dismay

Year posting after year,

Sense after sense decay;

Our shivering heart is mined by secret discontent;

Yet still, in spite of truth,
In spite of hopes entombed,

That longing of our youth

Burns ever unconsumed,

Still hungrier for delight as delights grow more rare.

We pause; we hush our heart,

And then address the Gods:

"The world hath failed to impart

The joy our youth forebodes,

Failed to fill up the void which in our breasts we

bear.