He knows how much of what men paint themselves Would blister in the light of what they are;He sees how much of what was great now shares An eminence transformed and ordinary;He knows too much of what the world has hushed In others, to be loud now for himself;He knows now at what height low enemies May reach his heart, and high friends let him fall;But what not even such as he may know Bedevils him the worst: his lark may sing At heaven's gate how he will, and for as long As joy may listen; but HE sees no gate, Save one whereat the spent clay waits a little Before the churchyard has it, and the worm.
Not long ago, late in an afternoon, I came on him unseen down Lambeth way, And on my life I was afear'd of him:
He gloomed and mumbled like a soul from Tophet, His hands behind him and his head bent solemn.
"What is it now," said I, -- "another woman?"That made him sorry for me, and he smiled.
"No, Ben," he mused; "it's Nothing.It's all Nothing.
We come, we go; and when we're done, we're done;Spiders and flies -- we're mostly one or t'other --We come, we go; and when we're done, we're done.""By God, you sing that song as if you knew it!"Said I, by way of cheering him; "what ails ye?""I think I must have come down here to think,"Says he to that, and pulls his little beard;"Your fly will serve as well as anybody, And what's his hour? He flies, and flies, and flies, And in his fly's mind has a brave appearance;And then your spider gets him in her net, And eats him out, and hangs him up to dry.
That's Nature, the kind mother of us all.
And then your slattern housemaid swings her broom, And where's your spider? And that's Nature, also.
It's Nature, and it's Nothing.It's all Nothing.
It's all a world where bugs and emperors Go singularly back to the same dust, Each in his time; and the old, ordered stars That sang together, Ben, will sing the same Old stave to-morrow."When he talks like that, There's nothing for a human man to do But lead him to some grateful nook like this Where we be now, and there to make him drink.