A still small voice spake unto me, 'Thou art so full of misery, Were it not better not to be?

Oh that it were possible, After long grief and pain, To find the arms of my true love, Around me once again

One so small Who knowing nothing knows but to obey.

A still small voice spake unto me, 'Thou art so full of misery, Were it not better not to be?

Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle of Cathay.

And statesmen at her council met Who knew the seasons, when to take Occasion by the hand, and make The bounds of freedom wider yet.

There rolls the deep where grew the tree. O earth, what changes hast thou seen! There where the long street roars, hath been The stillness of the central sea. The hills are shadows, and they flow From form to form, and nothing stands; They melt like mist, the solid lands, Like clouds they shape themselves and go.