"
Nothing can be as it has been before;
Better, so call it, only not the same.
To draw one beauty into our hearts' core,
And keep it changeless! such our claim;
So answered,--Never more!
Simple? Why, this is the old woe o' the world,
Tune to whose rise and fall we live and die.
Rise through it, then! Rejoice that man is hurled
From change to change unceasingly,
His soul's wings never furled!
That's a new question; still remains the fact,
Nothing endures: the wind moans, saying so;
We moan in acquiescence: there's life's pact,
Perhaps probation,--do _I_ know?
God does: endure His act!
Only, for man, how bitter not to grave
On his soul's hands' palms one fair, good, wise thing
Just as he grasped it! For himself, death's wave;
While time first washes--ah, the sting!--
O'er all he'd sink to save.
SEVEN WEEKS IN THE GREAT YO-SEMITE.
It is as hard to leave San Francisco as to get there. To a traveller
paying his first visit it has the interest of a new planet. It ignores
the meteorological laws which govern the rest of the world. There is no
snow there. There are no summer showers. The tailor recognizes no
aphelion or perihelion in his custom: the thin woollen suit which his
patron had made in April is comfortably worn until April again.
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