Not for such hopes and fears
Annulling youth’s brief years,
Do I remonstrate:  folly wide the mark! 
Rather I prize the doubt
Low kinds exist without,
Finish’d and finite clods, untroubled by a spark.

Poor vaunt of life indeed,
Were man but formed to feed
On joy, to solely seek and find and feast: 
Such feasting ended, then
As sure an end to men;
Irks care the crop-full bird?  Frets doubt the maw-cramm’d beast?

Rejoice we are allied
To That which doth provide
And not partake, effect and not receive! 
A spark disturbs our clod;
Nearer we hold of God
Who gives, than of His tribes that take, I must believe.

Then, welcome each rebuff
That turns earth’s smoothness rough,
Each sting, that bids nor sit nor stand, but go! 
Be our joys three parts pain! 
Strive, and hold cheap the strain;
Learn, nor account the pang; dare, never grudge the throe!

For thence,—­a paradox
Which comforts while it mocks,—­
Shall life succeed in that it seems to fail: 
What I aspired to be,
And was not, comforts me: 
A brute I might have been, but would not sink i’ the scale.

What is he but a brute
Whose flesh has soul to suit,
Whose spirit works lest arms and legs want play? 
To man, propose this test—­
Thy body at its best,
How far can that project thy soul on its lone way?

Yet gifts should prove their use: 
I own the Past profuse
Of power each side, perfection every turn: 
Eyes, ears took in their dole,
Brain treasured up the whole: 
Should not the heart beat once “How good to live and learn?”

Not once beat “Praise be Thine! 
I see the whole design,
I, who saw power, see now love perfect too: 
Perfect I call Thy plan: 
Thanks that I was a man! 
Maker, remake, complete,—­I trust what Thou shalt do!”

For pleasant is this flesh,
Our soul, in its rose-mesh
Pull’d ever to the earth, still yearns for rest;
Would we some prize might hold
To match those manifold
Possessions of the brute,—­gain most, as we did best!

Let us not always say,
“Spite of this flesh to-day
I strove, made head, gained ground upon the whole!”
As the bird wings and sings,
Let us cry, “All good things
Are ours, nor soul helps flesh more, now, than flesh helps soul!”

Therefore I summon age
To grant youth’s heritage,
Life’s struggle having so far reached its term: 
Thence shall I pass, approved
A man, for aye removed
From the developed brute; a god though in the germ.

And I shall thereupon
Take rest, ere I be gone
Once more on my adventure brave and new: 
Fearless and unperplex’d,
When I wage battle next,
What weapons to select, what armour to indue.

Youth ended, I shall try
My gain or loss thereby;
Leave the fire ashes, what survives is gold: 
And I shall weigh the same,
Give life its praise or blame: 
Young, all lay in dispute; I shall know, being old.