A Character

At night he said, "The wanderings

Of this most intricate Universe

Teach me the nothingness of things."

Yet could not all creation pierce

Beyond the bottom of his eye.

Saw no divinity in grass,

Life in dead stones, or spirit in air;

Then looking as 'twere in a glass,

He smooth'd his chin and sleek'd his hair,

And said the earth was beautiful.

More purely, when the wish to charm

Pallas and Juno sitting by:

And with a sweeping of the arm,

And a lack-lustre dead-blue eye,

Devolved his rounded periods.

He canvass'd human mysteries,

And trod on silk, as if the winds

Blew his own praises in his eyes,

And stood aloof from other minds

In impotence of fancied power.

Himself unto himself he sold:

Upon himself himself did feed:

Quiet, dispassionate, and cold,

And other than his form of creed,

With chisell'd features clear and sleek.