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Lucile

By Owen Meredith [i.e. E. R. B. Lytton]
  

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31

IX.

Both brilliant and brittle, both bold and unstable,
Indecisive yet keen, Alfred Vargrave seem'd able
To dazzle, but not to illumine, mankind.
A vigorous, various, versatile mind;
A character wavering, fitful, uncertain,
As the shadow that shakes o'er a luminous curtain,
Vague and flitting, but on it for ever impressing
The shape of some substance at which you stand guessing:
When you said, ‘All is worthless and weak here,’ behold!
Into sight on a sudden there seem'd to unfold
Great outlines of strenuous truth in the man:
When you said, ‘This is genius,’ the outlines grew wan.
And his life, tho' in all things so gifted and skill'd,
Was, at best, but a promise which nothing fulfill'd.