31
There are exceptional beings, one finds them distant and rarely,
Who, endowed with the vision alike and the interpretation,
See, by their neighbours' eyes, and their own still motions enlightened,
In the beginning the end, in the acorn the oak of the forest,
In the child of to-day its children to long generations,
In a thought or a wish a life, a drama, an epos.
There are inheritors, is it? by mystical generation,
Heiring the wisdom and ripeness of spirits gone-by; without labour
Owning what others by doing and suffering earn; what old men
After long years of mistake and erasure are proud to have come to,
Sick with mistake and erasure possess when possession is idle.
Yes, there is power upon earth, seen feebly in women and children,
Which can, laying one hand on the cover, read-off, unfaltering,
Leaf after leaf unlifted, the words of the closed book under,
Words which we are poring at, hammering at, stumbling at, spelling.
Rare is this; to many in pittance and modicum given,
Working, an instinct blind, in woman and child and rustic,
Rare in full measure, and often e'en then too maimed and hampered;
When with the power of speech, and the spirit united of music,
Lo, a new day has dawned, and the ages wait upon Shakespeare—
Rare is this; wisdom mostly is bought for a price in the market,—
Rare is this; and happy, who buy so much for so little,
As I conceive have you, and as I will hope has Katie.
Knowledge is needful for man—needful no less for woman,
Even in Highland glens, were they vacant of shooter and tourist.
Not that, of course, I mean to prefer your blindfold hurry
Unto a soul that abides most loving yet most withholding;
Least unfeeling though calm, self-contained yet most unselfish;
Renders help and accepts it, a man among men that are brothers,
Views, not plucks the beauty, adores, and demands no embracing,
So in its peaceful passage whatever is lovely and gracious
Still without seizing or spoiling, itself in itself reproducing.
No, I do not set Philip herein on the level of Arthur,
No, I do not compare still tarn with furious torrent,
Yet will the tarn overflow, assuaged in the lake be the torrent.
Women are weak as you say, and love of all things to be passive,
Passive, patient, receptive, yea even of wrong and misdoing,
Even to force and misdoing with joy and victorious feeling
Passive, patient, receptive; for that is the strength of their being,
Like to the earth taking all things and all to good converting.
