And earthly change from Pain to pain,

And lost, and ready to despair,

Thy kind voice calls me back again:

Oh, my true friend! I am not lone,

While then canst speak with such a tone!

The world within I doubly prize;

Thy world, where guile, and hate, and doubt,

And cold suspicion never rise;

Where thou, and I, and Liberty,

Have undisputed sovereignty.

What matters it, that all around

Danger, and guilt, and darkness lie,

If but within our bosom’s bound

We hold a bright, untroubled sky,

Warm with ten thousand mingled rays

Of suns that know no winter days ?

Reason, indeed, may oft complain

For Nature’s sad reality,

And tell the suffering heart how vain

Its cherished dreams must always be;

And Truth may rudely trample down

The flowers of Fancy, newly-blown:

But thou art ever there, to bring

The hovering vision back, and breathe

New glories o’er the blighted spring,

And call a lovelier Life from Death.

And whisper, with a voice divine,

Of real worlds, as bright as thine.

I trust not to thy phantom bliss,

Yet, still, in evening’s quiet hour,

With never-failing thankfulness,

I welcome thee, Benignant Power;

Sure solacer of human cares,

And sweeter hope, when hope despairs !