My special thanks, whose even-balanced soul, From first youth tested up to extreme old age, Business could not make dull, nor passion wild: Who saw life steadily and saw it whole.

Nations are not truly great solely because the individuals composing them are numerous, free, and active; but they are great when these numbers, this freedom, and this activity are employed in the service of an ideal higher than that of an ordinary man, taken by himself.

Nature, with equal mind, Sees all her sons at play; Sees man control the wind, The wind sweep man away.

Not a having and a resting, but a growing and a becoming is the character of perfection as culture conceives it.

Now the wild white horses play,

Oh, born in days when wits were fresh and clear, And life ran gaily as the sparkling Thames; Before this strange disease of modern life, With its sick hurry, its divided aims, Its heads o’ertaxed, its palsied hearts, was rife.

Others abide our question. Thou art free. We ask and ask: Thou smilest and art still, Out-topping knowledge.