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“WHAT MAN HATH DONE” |
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The Poems of Richard Watson Gilder | ||
“WHAT MAN HATH DONE”
Thus did he speak, thus was he comforted:
“I yet shall learn to live ere I am dead;
I shall be firm of will, know false from true:
Each error will but show me how to do,
When next the occasion calls. I shall pursue
The path that grim experience has taught.”
This was his solace, this his saving thought.
Then came a sudden knocking at the door.
He rose—and did what he had done before:
He looked into the dark, he flinched, he quailed;
The occasion came, and once again he failed.
“I yet shall learn to live ere I am dead;
I shall be firm of will, know false from true:
Each error will but show me how to do,
337
The path that grim experience has taught.”
This was his solace, this his saving thought.
Then came a sudden knocking at the door.
He rose—and did what he had done before:
He looked into the dark, he flinched, he quailed;
The occasion came, and once again he failed.
Thus wrote a man who had seen much of men:
“What man hath done, that will he do again.”
“What man hath done, that will he do again.”
Yet are there souls who, having clinched with fate,
Have learned to live, ere it was all too late.
Be it thy hope, tho' seven times a fool,
To get some lessons in life's fearful school.
Have learned to live, ere it was all too late.
Be it thy hope, tho' seven times a fool,
To get some lessons in life's fearful school.
The Poems of Richard Watson Gilder | ||