Yes! I have been for many a changeful year, Studious or sensual, gay or wild, or sad, An earnest votary of Evening. She Had something wondrous winning to my eye, So soft she was, and quiet. Often too, Absorbed in books, which were perchance a bane, Perchance a blessing; or in glittering crowds, Gazing all rapt on woman's eloquent face, Nature's most witching and most treacherous page; Or high in mirth with those whose senseful wit Outflashed the rosy wines that warmed its flow, I've held my vigils till the brow of Night Grew pale and starless, and her solemn pomp, Out-glared by day, faded in hueless space. I do repent me of my worship. Night Was given for rest: who breaks this natural law Wrongs body and soul alike. One vigorous hour Of sober day-light thought is worth a night's Slow oscitations of a drowsy mind. 'Neath Eve's pale star the desolate heart reverts To those far moments, when the sky was blue, And earth was green, as earth and sky to eyes Once disenchanted, can appear no more. We _all_ are mourners. Good men must deplore Lost hours, lost friends, lost pleasures; and the bad Are racked by throes of impotent remorse, Dark, fierce, and bitter; for _themselves_ are lost, And still neglecting what remains of life, They strive by backward reachings to redeem The irredeemable. _Why_ pass the hours, The fleeting hours, in profitless regrets, When each regret but lops _another_ bough, Full of green promise, from the tree of life? You, who in your bereavement truly feel This truth, expressed so sadly and so well: 'Joy's recollection is no longer joy, While Sorrow's memory is sorrow still;' I counsel to recant your vows, and come With me to worship at a better shrine, The shrine of Morning. Morning is the hour Of vigorous thought, unconquerable hope, And high endeavor. All our powers, in sleep Bathed, nurtured, clad, and strung with nerves of steel, Rise from their brief oblivion keen with health, And strong for struggling, and we feel that toil Is toil's own recompense. I deem that Man Is not a retrospective being; for his course Is on, still on; and never should his eyes Turn back, but to detect his errors past, And shun them in his future steps. Too long, Ah! much too long, O world! and oft I've gazed In awe and wonder on thy midnight sleep, While magic Memory, singly or in groups, Upon her faded tablets re-produced Fair and familiar forms of Love and Joy. Oh! _so_ familiar were they, and so fair, Though dim, those blessed faces, that my eyes Grew tremulous with the dew of unshed tears. The gaze hath hurt me. It hath taken their rest And natural joy from body and spirit, and worn Too fast the wheel-work of this frail machine. And now, oh! sleeping Nature! while the stars Smile on thy face, and I in fancy hear The low pulsations of thy dormant life,