Canto LII

How many a father have I seen,

      A sober man, among his boys,

      Whose youth was full of foolish noise,

Who wears his manhood hale and green;

And dare we to this fancy give

      That had the wild oat not been sown,

      The soil, left barren, scarce had grown

The grain by which a man may live?

Oh! if we held the doctrine sound

      For life outliving heats of youth,

      Yet who would preach it as a truth

To those that eddy round and round?

Hold thou the good: define it well:

      For fear divine philosophy

      Should push beyond her mark, and be

Procuress to the Lords of Hell.