Madmoments: or First Verseattempts By a Bornnatural. Addressed to the Lightheaded of Society at Large, by Henry Ellison |
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 | Madmoments: or First Verseattempts |  |
REAL GOODS HOW EARNED?
Life's genuine Goods by Rich and Poor are wonIn the same Fashion: they are neither bought
With Gold nor go by Precedence, but wrought
By our own Labour: nay, 'tis this alone
That gives them Value— Patience must be shown
In Bearing and Selfsacrifice, but naught
Is harder practiced by, or rarer taught
The Rich, than this, whose Minds in Ease have grown
Enfeebled, dazzled by mere Shine and Show:
Too many Goods are none— they are enjoyed
Imperfectly, the Heart's not filled, but cloyed:
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Infinitude of lesser Goods can e'er
Supply the Place of, nay, these are not so
Without that great Good, the «true Feeling, clear
And godlike, of Man's Life!» which once destroyed,
Then is the Compass lost, by which to steer
All Action and Affection to fit End!
For without this, we shall be apt, I fear,
To set Life's Byaims above those which lend
It all its Worth and Grandeur, and to make
Th' Essential's Place the Accidental take:
To merge the «Man» in that which is but here
The Mask and Mumming in which they appear,
Or rather disappear, to speak aright!
The Poor now is most likely to be quite
«A Man,» for in him Heart and Feeling tend
To rouse, and to keep steadily in View
The grand and simple Duties, which delight
A Spirit quite a wake, to Nature true.
Then would the Richman win this Good, he too
Must cast his Wealth away, which dissipates
Life's Oneness, fritters it away, creates
A Multiplicity of Details, where
The one grand Feeling of this so, so fair
Existence, is quite lost: 'tis like a Glass
Shattered in Fragments, 'till the Form, which was
Grand, whole, and godlike, can no more be there-
In recognized: and since 'tis the full Light
Of this same Feeling brings out clear to Sight,
The Outline both of Man and God, if we
Once lose it, we are no more «Men,» and he
To us not God! he must from that lone Height
Descend then to the Level of those who
By common Wants of frail Humanity
Keep sound the Heart by Contact, faithful to
That Law which brings the Tear into the Eye,
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For not to need our Fellowmen that is
The worst Ill— thus from having naught to miss,
We miss all, nay, grow a Nonentity!
But if by casting Wealth away he grow
Patient, what other Wealth needs he below?
| Madmoments: or First Verseattempts | |