THE SCHOLAR GIPSY
Exhaust the energy of strongest souls.
And numb the elastic powers.
Till having used our nerves with bliss and teen,
And tired upon a thousand schemes our wit,
To the just-pausing Genius we remit
Our worn-out life, and are—what we have
been.
Thou hast not lived, why should'st thou perish, so ?
Thou hadst one aim, one business, one desire ;
Else wert thou long since number'd with the
dead !
Else hadst thou spent, like other men, thy fire ! 10
The generations of thy peers are fled,
And we ourselves shall go ;
But thou possessest an immortal lot.
And we imagine thee exempt from age
And living as thou liv'st on Glanvil's page,
Because thou hadst—what we, alas ! have not.
For early didst thou leave the world, with powers
Fresh, undiverted to the world without,
Firm to their mark, not spent on other things ;
Free from the sick fatigue, the languid doubt, 20
Which much to have tried, in much been baffled,
brings.
O life unlike to ours !
Who fluctuate idly without term or scope,
Of whom each strives, nor knows for what he
strives,
And each half lives a hundred different lives ;
Who wait like thee, but not, like thee, in hope.
Thou waitest for the spark from heaven ! and we,
Light half-believers of our casual creeds,
Who never deeply felt, nor clearly will'd,
Whose insight never has borne fruit in deeds, 30
127