A thousand dumb-voiced stars beseech our eyes
And lend a magic to the lonely night;
True world-historians of all hopes and sighs,
Might we but spell their story from your light.
Loves, hopes, philosophies, religions, powers,
Feed on themselves, quickened by their own fall:
And years but mock at years, and hours at hours,
Processions furnish soon their grandeur’s pall:
Even now ye gaze on hopes, that live in death,
On many a various god of wealth or pride,
On schemes, fated to fail, on learning’s breath,
Soon choked by dust, or blown by truth aside:
Ambition, strong to live, must feel decay;
What shall not fade? can priests or sages say?