I shall soon be six-and-twenty. Is there anything in the future that can possibly console us for not being always twenty-five?

Absence - that common cure of love.

What exile from himself can flee? To zones, though more and more remote, Still, still pursues, where'er I be, The blight of life--the demon Thought.

This is the patent age of new inventions for killing bodies, and for saving souls. All propagated with the best intentions.

Just as old age is creeping on space, And clouds come o'er the sunset of our day, They kindly leave us, though not quite alone, But in good company--the gout or stone.

Our life is two fold Sleep hath its own world, A boundary between the things misnamed Death and existence Sleep hath its own world, And a wide realm of wild reality.

For pleasures past I do not grieve, nor perils gathering near; My greatest grief is that I leave nothing that claims a tear.