by Samuel Gower.
Originally published in Hood's Magazine (Henry Hurst) vol.6 #6 (Dec 1846).
Happiness is too amply what it is,
To vaunt of its own qualities and value;
And the deep river passes quiet by
Without or song or murmur: its sweet voice
Is for the heart, not ear: and, to itself,
So all-sufficient as to need no words:
No empty proclamations does it make:
That is not genuine happiness which seeks
Knowledge and praise of the unkindred, and
The foreign to its own sweet natural self.
Why should we lash our being into storms
Of artificial birth and growth and nurture,
And hang forth mock suns of reflected passion,
And daub with portents as grotesque as dire,
The canvass of our brief existence, while
All nature reigns within us and without us,
Shedding from her meek sceptre, gently round,
Whate'er the heart needs for its full content?
Fame it needs not, save in so far as fame
Speaks human-kind's accumulative love;
As such 'tis solely valued, nor, as such,
Sought as an end, except by noble means,
The means more valued even than the end:—
For this cause many find who seek it not,
And hence it is so many seek and find not.
Strive with thy own heart in sweet silent commune,
Not with thy fellows for the bauble—fame.
Who lives in love, lives, and so dies, in peace—
Who aims at more than this, aims at too much;
Call it or fame, or whatsoe'er we may,
The recompense of those who strive is—strife.
Be wise— good—so, be happy: and whate'er
Beyond accrues—and what beyond is needed?—
Let it come, as the wind blows, how it will.
Hampstead, Nov. 1846.