THOUGH you are in your shining days, Voices among the crowd And new friends busy with your praise, Be not unkind or proud, But think about old friends the most: Time's bitter flood will rise, Your beauty perish and be lost For all eyes but these eyes.

The Irishman sustains himself during brief periods of joy by the knowledge that tragedy is just around the corner.

Everything that's lovely is But a brief, dreamy kind of delight.

Accursed who brings to light of day the writings I have cast away.

I have no question: It is enough, I know what fixed the station Of star and cloud. And knowing all, I cry. . . .

Nor dread nor hope attend a dying animal; a man awaits his end dreading and hoping all.

It was my first meeting with a philosophy that confirmed my vague speculations and seemed at once logical and boundless.