Keeping, each losel, through a maze of lies, His own conceit of truth? to which he hies By obscure windings, tortuous, if you will, But to himself not inaccessible; He sees truth, and his lies are for the crowd Who cannot see; some fancied right allowed His vilest wrong, empowered the losel clutch One pleasure from a multitude of such [Sidenote: As those who desist should remember.] Denied him." Then assert, "All men appear To think all better than themselves, by here Trusting a crowd they wrong; but really," say, "All men think all men stupider than they, Since, save themselves, no other comprehends The complicated scheme to make amends --Evil, the scheme by which, through Ignorance, Good labors to exist." A slight advance,-- Merely to find the sickness you die through, And naught beside! but if one can't eschew One's portion in the common lot, at least One can avoid an ignorance increased Tenfold by dealing out hint after hint How naught were like dispensing without stint The water of life--so easy to dispense Beside, when one has probed the centre whence Commotion 's born--could tell you of it all! "--Meantime, just meditate my madrigal O' the mugwort that conceals a dewdrop safe!" What, dullard? we and you in smothery chafe, Babes, baldheads, stumbled thus far into Zin The Horrid, getting neither out nor in, A hungry sun above us, sands that bung Our throats,--each dromedary lolls a tongue, Each camel churns a sick and frothy chap, And you, 'twixt tales of Potiphar's mishap, And sonnets on the earliest ass that spoke, --Remark, you wonder any one needs choke With founts about! Potsherd him, Gibeonites! While awkwardly enough your Moses smites The rock, though he forego his Promised Land Thereby, have Satan claim his carcass, and Figure as Metaphysic Poet ... ah, Mark ye the dim first oozings? Meribah! Then, quaffing at the fount my courage gained, Recall--not that I prompt ye--who explained ... "Presumptuous!" interrupts one. You, not I 'T is, brother, marvel at and magnify [Sidenote: Let the poet take his own part, then,] Such office: "office," quotha? can we get To the beginning of the office yet? What do we here? simply experiment Each on the other's power and its intent When elsewhere tasked,--if this of mine were trucked For yours to either's good,--we watch construct, In short, an engine: with a finished one, What it can do, is all,--naught, how 't is done. But this of ours yet in probation, dusk A kernel of strange wheelwork through its husk Grows into shape by quarters and by halves; Remark this tooth's spring, wonder what that valve's Fall bodes, presume each faculty's device, Make out each other more or less precise-- The scope of the whole engine 's to be proved;