The Dream of Life

With the old childish speculationsAnd unexplaining explanations:Trusting in old worn-out traditions,Or newly-minted superstitions,Which prove to be, when tested, naughtBut bastard spawn of ancient thought;Nothing we see in truth's pure light,But all in falsehood's hues bedight;The cup from life's pure fount declineTo drug ourselves with poisoned wine;Curse fate which does but give us scopeTo hang ourselves with our own rope;With all that we can use or needGrasping at more with sateless greed;Ever, though mocked and mortified,Parading with a peacock's pride;Matching brave words with coward deeds,Fettering our souls with craven creeds;For ever forging chains to bindIn straiter bondage heart and mind.

Dreams within dreams and dreams within themWe spin and never cease to spin them.The victims ever of illusions.And mocking protean delusions:The playthings of ironic fate.Dreaming we live and love and hate;Striving though strife brings naught but pain,Hoping though all our hopes are vain;Seeking for what we may not find,Wayward and roving as the wind;Shadows for ever we pursue,And still the bootless chase renew;

Prefer a Will o' the Wisp's false lightTo Reason's lanthorn dear and bright;Heap follies upon follies tillThey overmaster mind and will,And, rendering us to reason blind,Perversity controls the mind;For truth pretend to yearn, but whenShe shows herself, avert our kenIn mortal fear her gaze so sternWin all our weaknesses discern,And an the errors that we cherish'Neath her too-piercing eyesight perish.

Soaring, alas! how soon we tire,To sink yet deeper in the mire,Yet from our deepest degradation,Ascend to heights of exaltation,For still there shines a spark withinThat's never wholly quenched by sin.

Look through a microscope and seeThe countless animalculæThat in a drop of water dwell:—Think you the creatures do not swellWith self-importance at the thoughtThat the whole universe was wroughtSolely to give them such a home,With space so vast in which to roam?And who shall say they are not wiseAt a high rate themselves to prize?Since in Dame Nature's wondrous scheme,Where miracles on all sides teem,

We know not what she may accountOf her creations paramount;Or rather say, her equal eyeDoth all impartially descry,Nothing to her is great or small,Alike her bosom fosters all,Despises naught, loves none too wellOf all that in her kingdom dwell,But gives to all whate'er they needFavouring no more the flower than weed.

What but a dream is all that's past?The Future's but a dream forecast;If aught that's not a dream can be'Tis what we in the present see,But that dissolves before our eyesEre we its import realise;Strive as we may to hold it fast.Naught that we see or feel may last;As in a swiftly-moving trainWe motionless seem to remain,While the receding landscape fliesSo fast it mocks our straining eyes—So are we hurried on our way,No time to think, no power to stay;With swifter and yet swifter pace,Onward, we know not where, we race,Until, amazed and out of breath,We reach the final station—Death.

So in a tangled maze of errors.Of sins, perplexities and terrors,