But always all in awe And imminent dread: Because there is no mischief thought or said, Imaginable or unguessed, But it may come to be; nor home of rest, Nor hour secure: but anywhere, At any moment; in the air, 1190 Or on the earth or sea, Or in the fair And tender body itself it lurks, creeps in, Or seizes suddenly, Torturing, burning, withering, devouring, Shaking, destroying; till tormented life Sides with the slayer, not to be, And from the cruel strife Falls to fate overpowering. Or if some patient heart, 1200 In toilsome steps of duty tread apart, Thinking to win her peace within herself, And thus awhile succeed: She must see others bleed, At others' misery moan, And learn the common suffering is her own, From which it is no freedom to be freed: Nay, Nature, her best nurse, Is tender but to breed a finer sense, Which she may easier wound, with smart the worse 1210 And torture more intense. And no strength for thee but the thought of duty, Nor any solace but the love of beauty. O Right's toil unrewarded! O Love's prize unaccorded! I say this might suffice, O tearful and unstable And miserable man, Were't but from day to day Thy miserable lot, 1220 This might suffice, I say, To term thee miserable. But thou of all thine ills too must take thought, Must grow familiar till no curse astound thee, With tears recall the past, With tears the times forecast; With tears, with tears thou hast The scapeless net spread in thy sight around thee. How then support thy fate, O miserable man, if this befall, 1230 That he who loves thee and would aid thee, daring To raise an arm for thy deliverance, Must for his courage suffer worse than all? IN. Bravest deliverer, for thy prophecy Has torn the veil which hid thee from my eyes, If thyself art that spirit, of whom some things Were darkly spoken,--nor can I doubt thou art, Being that the heaven its fire withholds not from thee Nor time his secrets,--tell me now thy name, That I may praise thee rightly; and my late 1240 Unwitting words pardon thou, and these who still In blinded wonder kneel not to thy love.