Читать книгу Poems of Arthur Hugh Clough - Arthur Hugh Clough - Страница 21

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Thought may well be ever ranging,

And opinion ever changing,

Task-work be, though ill begun,

Dealt with by experience better;

By the law and by the letter

Duty done is duty done:

Do it, Time is on the wing!

Hearts, ’tis quite another thing,

Must or once for all be given,

Or must not at all be given;

Hearts, ’tis quite another thing!

To bestow the soul away

Is an idle duty-play!—

Why, to trust a life-long bliss

To caprices of a day,

Scarce were more depraved than this!

Men and maidens, see you mind it;

Show of love, where’er you find it,

Look if duty lurk behind it!

Duty-fancies, urging on

Whither love had never gone!

Loving—if the answering breast

Seem not to be thus possessed,

Still in hoping have a care;

If it do, beware, beware!

But if in yourself you find it,

Above all things—mind it, mind it!

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