“Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art!Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes.Why preyest thou thus upon the poet's heart,Vulture, whose wings are dull realities?How should he love thee? or how deem thee wise?Who wouldst not leave him in his wanderingTo seek for treasure in the jewelled skies,Albeit he soared with an undaunted wing?Hast thou not dragged Diana from her car?And driven the Hamadryad from the woodTo seek a shelter in some happier star?Hast thou not torn the Naiad from her flood,The Elfin from the green grass, and from meThe summer dream beneath the tamarind tree?”

“Oh, lady bright! can it be right-The window open to the night?The wanton airs, from the tree-top,Laughingly through the lattice drop -The bodiless airs, a wizard rout,Flit through thy chamber in and out,And wave the curtain canopySo fitfully - so fearfully -Above the closed and fringéd lid'Neath which thy slumb'ring soul lies hid,That, o'er the floor and down the wall,Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall!Oh, lady dear, hast thou no fear?”

“In seeking wisdom thou art wise in imagining that thou hast attained it - thou art a fool.”

“In seeking wisdom thou art wise; in imagining that thou hast attained it - thou art a fool.”

“How many actions most ridiculous/Hast thou been drawn to by thy fantasy?CORIN: Into a thousand that I have forgotten.SILVIUS: O, thou didst then ne'er love so heartily!/If thou remember'st not the slightest folly/That ever love did make thee run into,/Thou hast not loved:/Or if thou hast not sat as I do now,/Wearying thy hearer in thy mistress' praise,/Thou hast not loved...”

“And thou who thinkest to seek for me, know thy seeking and yearning shall avail thee not, unless thou know this mystery: that if that which thou seekest thou findest not within thee, thou wilt never find it without thee”

“To HelenI saw thee once-once only-years ago;I must not say how many-but not many.It was a july midnight; and from outA full-orbed moon, that, like thine own soul, soaring,Sought a precipitate pathway up through heaven,There fell a silvery-silken veil of light,With quietude, and sultriness, and slumberUpon the upturn'd faces of a thousandRoses that grew in an enchanted garden,Where no wind dared to stir, unless on tiptoe-Fell on the upturn'd faces of these rosesThat gave out, in return for the love-lightThier odorous souls in an ecstatic death-Fell on the upturn'd faces of these rosesThat smiled and died in this parterre, enchanted by thee, by the poetry of thy prescence.Clad all in white, upon a violet bank I saw thee half reclining; while the moonFell on the upturn'd faces of the rosesAnd on thine own, upturn'd-alas, in sorrow!Was it not Fate that, on this july midnight-Was it not Fate (whose name is also sorrow)That bade me pause before that garden-gate,To breathe the incense of those slumbering roses?No footstep stirred; the hated world all slept,Save only thee and me. (Oh Heaven- oh, God! How my heart beats in coupling those two worlds!)Save only thee and me. I paused- I looked-And in an instant all things disappeared.(Ah, bear in mind this garden was enchanted!)The pearly lustre of the moon went out;The mossy banks and the meandering paths,The happy flowers and the repining trees,Were seen no more: the very roses' odorsDied in the arms of the adoring airs.All- all expired save thee- save less than thou:Save only the divine light in thine eyes-Save but the soul in thine uplifted eyes.I saw but them- they were the world to me.I saw but them- saw only them for hours-Saw only them until the moon went down.What wild heart-histories seemed to lie enwrittenUpon those crystalline, celestial spheres!How dark a woe! yet how sublime a hope!How silently serene a sea of pride!How daring an ambition!yet how deep-How fathomless a capacity for love!But now, at length, dear Dian sank from sight,Into western couch of thunder-cloud;And thou, a ghost, amid the entombing treesDidst glide away. Only thine eyes remained.They would not go- they never yet have gone.Lighting my lonely pathway home that night,They have not left me (as my hopes have) since.They follow me- they lead me through the years.They are my ministers- yet I thier slaveThier office is to illumine and enkindle-My duty, to be saved by thier bright light,And purified in thier electric fire,And sanctified in thier Elysian fire.They fill my soul with Beauty (which is Hope),And are far up in heaven- the stars I kneel toIn the sad, silent watches of my night;While even in the meridian glare of dayI see them still- two sweetly scintillantVenuses, unextinguished by the sun!”