University of Virginia Library


94

She (for I know not yet her name in heaven)
Not early, like Narcissa, left the scene;
Nor sudden, like Philander. What avail?
This seeming mitigation but inflames;
This fancied medicine heightens the disease.
The longer known, the closer still she grew;
And gradual parting is a gradual death.
'Tis the grim tyrant's engine, which extorts
By tardy pressure's still-increasing weight,
From hardest hearts, confession of distress.
 

Referring to Night the Fifth.