The Artifice.

Dost thou desire the good in art? Of the good art thou worthy,
Which by a ne'er ceasing war 'gainst thee thyself is produced?

If thou feelest not the beautiful, still thou with reason canst will it;
And as a spirit canst do, that which as man thou canst not.

No! I this conflict longer will not wage,
The conflict duty claims the giant task;
Thy spells, O virtue, never can assuage
The heart's wild fire this offering do not ask

True, I have sworn a solemn vow have sworn,
That I myself will curb the self within;
Yet take thy wreath, no more it shall be worn
Take back thy wreath, and leave me free to sin.

Rent be the contract I with thee once made;
She loves me, loves me forfeit be the crown!
Blessed he who, lulled in rapture's dreamy shade,
Glides, as I glide, the deep fall gladly down.

She sees the worm that my youth's bloom decays,
She sees my spring-time wasted as it flees;
And, marvelling at the rigor that gainsays
The heart's sweet impulse, my reward decrees.

Distrust this angel purity, fa...

See in the babe two loveliest flowers united yet in truth,
While in the bud they seem the same the virgin and the youth!
But loosened is the gentle bond, no longer side by side
From holy shame the fiery strength will soon itself divide.
Permit the youth to sport, and still the wild desire to chase,
For, but when sated, weary strength returns to seek the grace.
Yet in the bud, the double flowers the future strife begin,
How precious all yet naught can still the longing heart within.
In ripening charms the virgin bloom to woman shape hath grown,
But round the ripening charms the pride hath clasped its guardian zone;
Shy, as before the hunter's horn the doe all trembling moves,
She flies from man as from a foe, and hates before she loves!

From lowering brows this struggling wo...

To Archimedes once a scholar came,
"Teach me," he said, "the art that won thy fame;
The godlike art which gives such boons to toil,
And showers such fruit upon thy native soil;
The godlike art that girt the town when all
Rome's vengeance burst in thunder on the wall!"
"Thou call'st art godlike it is so, in truth,
And was," replied the master to the youth,
"Ere yet its secrets were applied to use
Ere yet it served beleaguered Syracuse:
Ask'st thou from art, but what the art is worth?
The fruit? for fruit go cultivate the earth.
He who the goddess would aspire unto,
Must not the goddess as the woman woo!"

Forever fair, forever calm and bright,
Life flies on plumage, zephyr-light,
For those who on the Olympian hill rejoice
Moons wane, and races wither to the tomb,
And 'mid the universal ruin, bloom
The rosy days of Gods With man, the choice,
Timid and anxious, hesitates between
The sense's pleasure and the soul's content;
While on celestial brows, aloft and sheen,
The beams of both are blent.

Seekest thou on earth the life of gods to share,
Safe in the realm of death? beware
To pluck the fruits that glitter to thine eye;
Content thyself with gazing on their glow
Short are the joys possession can bestow,
And in possession sweet desire will die.
'Twas not the ninefold chain of waves that bound
Thy daughter, Ceres, to the Stygian river
She plucked t...