The Second Best

Moderate tasks and moderate leisure,     Quiet living, strict-kept measure     Both in suffering and in pleasure     Tis for this thy nature yearns.     But so many books thou readest,     But so many schemes thou breedest,     But so many wishes feedest,     That thy poor head almost turns.     And (the worlds so madly jangled,     Human things so fast entangled)     Natures wish must now be strangled     For that best which she discerns.     So it must be! yet, while leading     A straind life, while overfeeding,     Like the rest, his wit with reading,     No small profit that man earns,     Who through all he meets can steer him,     Can reject what cannot clear him,     Cling to what can truly cheer him!     Who each day more surely learns     That an impulse, from the distance     Of his deepest, best existence,     To the words Hope, Light, Persistence,     Strongly stirs and truly burns!