There sinks the nebulous star we call the sun.
Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle of Cathay.
And sometimes through the mirror blue The knights come riding two and two.
Dreams are true while they last, and do we not live in dreams?
This world was once a fluid haze of light, Till toward the centre set the starry tides, And eddied into suns, that wheeling cast The planets: then the monster, then the man.
From yon blue heavens above us bent The gardener Adam and his wife Smile at the claims of long descent. Howe'er it be, it seems to me, 'Tis only noble to be good. Kind hearts are more than coronets, And simple faith than Norman blood.