use designed?
Now let me right this heart that was bewrayed—
      Unveil these eyes gone blind.

My well-beloved friend, at noon to-day
  Over our cliffs a white mist lay unfurled,
So thick, one standing on their brink might say,
      Lo, here doth end the world.

A white abyss beneath, and nought beside;
  Yet, hark! a cropping sound not ten feet down:
Soon I could trace some browsing lambs that hied
      Through rock-paths cleft and brown.

And here and there green tufts of grass peered through,
  Salt lavender, and sea thrift; then behold
The mist, subsiding ever, bared to view
      A beast of giant mould.

She seemed a great sea-monster lying content
  With all her cubs about her: but deep—deep—
The subtle mist went floating; its descent
      Showed the world's end was steep.

It shook, it melted, shaking more, till, lo,
  The sprawling monster was a rock; her brood
Were boulders, whereon sea-mews white as snow
      Sat watching for their food.

Then once again it sank, its day was done:
  Part rolled away, part vanished utterly,
And glimmering softly under the white sun,
      Behold! a great white sea.

O that the mist which veileth my To-come
  Would so dissolve and yield unto mine eyes
A worthy path! I'd count not wearisome
      Long toil, nor enterprise,

But strain to reach it; ay, with wrestlings stout
  And hopes that even in the dark will grow
(Like plants in dungeons, reaching feelers out),
      And ploddings wary and slow.

Is there such path already made to fit
  The measure of my foot? It shall atone
For much, if I at length may light on it
      And know it for mine own.

But is there none? why, then, 'tis more than well:
  And glad at heart myself will hew one out,
Let me he only sure; for, sooth to tell,
      The sorest dole is doubt—

Doubt, a blank twilight of the heart, which mars
  All sweetest colors in its dimness same;
A soul-mist, through whose rifts familiar stare
      Beholding, we misname.

A ripple on the inner sea, which shakes
  Those images that on its breast reposed;
A fold upon a wind-swayed flag, that breaks
      The motto it disclosed.

O doubt! O doubt! I know my destiny;
  I feel thee fluttering bird-like in my breast;
I cannot loose, but I will sing to thee,
      And flatter thee to rest.

There is no certainty, "my bosom's guest,"
  No proving for the things whereof ye wot;
For, like the dead to sight unmanifest,
      They are, and they are not.

But surely as they are, for God is truth,
  And as they are not, for we saw them die,
So surely from the heaven drops light for youth,
      If youth will walk thereby.

And can I see this light? It may be so;
  "But see it thus and thus," my fathers said.
The living do not rule this world; ah no!
      It is the dead, the dead.

Shall I be slave to every noble soul,
  Study the dead, and to their spirits bend;
Or learn to read my own heart's folded scroll,
      And make self-rule my end?

Thought from without—O shall I take on trust,
  And life from others modelled steal or win;
Or shall I heave to light, and clear of rust
      My true life from within?

O, let me be myself! But where, O where,
  Under this heap of precedent, this mound
Of customs, modes, and maxims, cumbrance rare,
      Shall the Myself be found?

O thou Myself, thy fathers thee debarred
  None of their wisdom, but their folly came
Therewith; they smoothed thy path, but made it hard
      For thee to quit the same.

With glosses they obscured God's natural truth,
  And with tradition tarnished His revealed;
With vain protections they endangered youth,
      With layings bare they sealed.

What aileth thee, myself? Alas! thy hands
  Are tied with old opinions—heir and son,
Thou hast inherited thy father's lands
      And all his debts thereon.

O that some power would give me Adam's eyes!
  O for the straight simplicity of Eve!
For I see nought, or grow, poor fool, too wise
      With seeing to believe.

Exemplars may be heaped until they hide
  The rules that they were made to render plain;
Love may be watched, her nature to decide,
      Until love's self doth wane.

Ah me! and when forgotten and foregone
  We leave the learning of departed days,
And cease the generations past to con,
      Their wisdom and their ways,—

When fain to learn we lean into the dark,
  And grope to feel the floor of the abyss,
Or find the secret boundary lines which mark
      Where soul and matter kiss—

Fair world! these puzzled souls of ours grow weak
  With beating their bruised wings against the rim
That bounds their utmost flying, when they seek
      The distant and the dim.

We pant, we strain like birds against their wires;
  Are sick to reach the vast and the beyond;—
And what avails, if still to our desires
      Those far-off gulfs respond?

Contentment comes not therefore; still there lies
  An outer distance when the first is hailed,
And still forever yawns before our eyes
      An UTMOST—that is veiled.

Searching those edges of the universe,
  We leave the central fields a fallow part;
To feed the eye more precious things amerce,
      And starve the darkened heart.

Then all goes wrong: the old foundations rock;
  One scorns at him of old who gazed unshod;
One striking with a pickaxe thinks the shock
      Shall move the seat of God.

A little way, a very little way
  (Life is so short), they dig into the rind,
And they are very sorry, so they say,—
      Sorry for what they find.

But truth is sacred—ay, and must be told:
  There is a story long beloved of man;
We must forego it, for it will not hold—
      Nature had no such plan.

And then, if "God hath said it," some should cry,
  We have the story from the fountain-head:
Why, then, what better than the old reply,
      The first "Yea, HATH God said?"

The garden, O the garden, must it go,
  Source of our hope and our most dear regret?
The ancient story, must it no more show
      How man may win it yet?

And all upon the Titan child's decree,
  The baby science, born but yesterday,
That in its rash unlearned infancy
      With shells and stones at play,

And delving in the outworks of this world,
  And little crevices that it could reach,
Discovered certain bones laid up, and