Am I contented? Yea and nay! For what's base but content to grow With less good than the best we know? But think me not from life withdrawn. By passion for a hope that's gone, So far as to forget how much A woman is, as merely such, To man's affection. What is best, In each, belongs to all the rest; And though, in marriage, quite to kiss And half to love the custom is, 'Tis such dishonour, ruin bare, The soul's interior despair, And life between two troubles toss'd, To me, who think not with the most; Whatever 'twould have been, before My Cousin's time, 'tis now so sore A treason to the abiding throne Of that sweet love which I have known, I cannot live so, and I bend My mind perforce to comprehend That He who gives command to love Does not require a thing above The strength He gives. The highest degree Of the hardest grace, humility; The step t'ward heaven the latest trod, And that which makes us most like God, And us much more than God behoves, Is, to be humble in our loves. Henceforth for ever therefore I Renounce all partiality Of passion. Subject to control Of that perspective of the soul Which God Himself pronounces good. Confirming claims of neighbourhood. And giving man, for earthly life, The closest neighbour in a wife, I'll serve all. Jane be munch more dear Than all as she is much more near! I'll love her! Yea, and love's joy comes Ever from self-love's martyrdoms! Yet, not to lie for God, 'tis true That 'twas another joy I knew When freighted was my heart with fire Of fond, irrational desire For fascinating, female charms, And hopeless heaven in Her mild arms. Nor wrong I any, if I profess That care for heaven with me were less But that I'm utterly imbued With faith of all Earth's hope renew'd In realms where no short-coming pains Expectance, and dear love disdains Time's treason, and the gathering dross, And lasts for ever in the gloss Of newness. All the bright past seems, Now, but a splendour in my dreams, Which shows, albeit the dreamer wakes, The standard of right life. Life aches To be therewith conform'd; but, oh, The world's so stolid, dark, and low! That and the mortal element Forbid the beautiful intent, And, like the unborn butterfly, It feels the wings, and wants the sky. But perilous is the lofty mood Which cannot yoke with lowly good. Right life, for me, is life that wends By lowly ways to lofty ends. I will perceive, at length, that haste T'ward heaven itself is only waste; And thus I dread the impatient spur Of aught that speaks too plain of Her. There's little here that story tells; But music talks of nothing else. Therefore, when music breathes, I say, (And urge my task,) Away, away! Thou art the voice of one I knew, But what thou say'st is not yet true; Thou art the voice of her I loved, And I would not be vainly moved. So that which did from death set free All things, now dons death's mockery, And takes its place with tunings that are But little noted. Do not mar