“Must come,” replied he, “or I go to it. Henceforth, let beauty’s beams but gleam for me, I shall not shun them, as has been my wont, But make my eyes a sun-glass for my heart, And let them burn it.” “May they burn,” I cried, “Until love’s fragrant opiate fume so strong It make your brain beclouded as a Turk’s. But I, alas, though wild o’er many a maid, Am never mad enough to marry her.” “You poets,” laugh’d he, “soar above earth so That common clouds like these can reach you not. But why say ‘clouds’? for clouds rise o’er a flame That smoulders. Love that burns is always clear.” “But mine will not burn clearly, till it show A woman,” said I, “fitted for a mate, Whose mind, like yours, can really match my own. Till then must memory, jealous for her past, Out-do love’s hope that cannot promise more.” “But maidens,” cried he, “are not loved like men. Bind beauty to their souls, then weigh the twain. If one weigh naught, he waives his judgment then. We must be practical.” Thus Elbert spoke, While I, for whom these light and vapory moods Had gather’d o’er that soul in slightest clouds, Not tokening the storm that yet should burst, Smiled only, thinking how, where throbb’d his heart, Some maid unnamed must surely stand and knock; Though this I had forgotten, save for that Which happen’d later. You shall hear of it. VI. It came in Dresden, something like a year More late than when my plan for life was changed. The change seem’d sudden; but, you know, the blow That swept from me my parents, fortune, all, Could not but stun me, and I could not think. No other theme seem’d mine; I could not write. So came my change—no myth—I felt it all:— One time, when, lonely, I to Christ had knelt, I rose to seem not lonely; I was His, He mine. I vow’d to live then but for Him, To break away from every cord of Earth, And make my life accordant with his own. Not only would I think the truth, but yield Each grain in all my being to the truth, And sow in wildest wastes, where all should germ In generations growing toward the good. But still, a novice yet, though, like St. Paul, To will was present with me; to perform I found not how; but, on performance bent, Within a chancel chanting with the choir, I stood before an altar, half the day, And half before my books, with cravings pale For church and stole and sermons of my own. VII.