4.
Action and Thought.
There is a world where struggle and stern toil1
Are all the nurture of the soul of man—2
Ordain’d to raise, from life’s ungrateful soil,3
Pain as he must and pleasure as he can.4
Then to that other world of thought from this5
Turns the sad soul, all hopeful of repose ;6
But round in weirdest metamorphosis,7
False shapes and true, divine and devilish, close.8
Above these two, and resting upon each9
A meditative and compassionate eye,10
Broodeth the Spirit of God : thence evermore,11
On those poor wanderers cast from shore to shore,12
Falleth a voice, omnipotent to teach13
Them that will hear— “ Despair not ! it is I.”14