O, I see thee old and formal, fitted to thy petty

part,

With a little hoard of maxims preaching down a

daughter's heart.

"They were dangerous guides the feelings-she herself was not exempt―

Truly, she herself had suffer'd”—Perish in thy self

contempt!

Overlive it lower yet

-be happy! wherefore

should I care?

I myself must mix with action, lest I wither by

despair.

What is that which I should turn to, lighting upon days like these?

Every door is barr'd with gold, and opens but to

golden keys.

Every gate is throng'd with suitors, all the markets

overflow.

I have but an angry fancy: what is that which I

should do?

I had been content to perish, falling on the foeman's

ground,

When the ranks are roll'd in vapour, and the winds are laid with sound.

But the jingling of the guinea helps the hurt that Honour feels,

And the nations do but murmur, snarling at each

other's heels.

Can I but relive in sadness? I will turn that earlier

page.

Hide me from my deep emotion, O thou wondrous

Mother-Age!

Make me feel the wild pulsation that I felt before

the strife,

When I heard my days before me, and the tumult . of my life;

Yearning for the large excitement that the coming years would yield,

Eager-hearted as a boy when first he leaves his father's field,

And at night along the dusky highway near and nearer drawn,

Sees in heaven the light of London flaring like a dreary dawn;

And his spirit leaps within him to be gone before

him then,

Underneath the light he looks at, in among the

throngs of men ;

Men, my brothers, men the workers, ever reaping

something new:

That which they have done but earnest of the things that they shall do:

For I dipt into the future, far as human eye could

see,

Saw the Vision of the world, and all the wonder that would be;

Saw the heavens fill with commerce, argosies of

magic sails,

Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with costly bales;

Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there

rain'd a ghastly dew

From the nations' airy navies grappling in the

central blue;

Far along the world-wide whisper of the south

wind rushing warm,

With the standards of the peoples plunging thro'

the thunder-storm;

Till the war-drum throbb'd no longer, and the battle-flags were furl'd

In the Parliament of man, the Federation of the

world.

There the common sense of most shall hold a

fretful realm in awe,

And the kindly earth shall slumber, lapt in universal law.

So I triumph'd ere my passion sweeping thro' me

left me dry,

Left me with the palsied heart, and left me with

the jaundiced eye;