Baby fingers, waxen touches, press me from the mother's breast. 90 O, the child too clothes the father with a dearness not his due. O, I see thee old and formal, fitted to thy petty part, With a little hoard of maxims preaching down a daughter's heart. I myself must mix with action, lest I wither by despair. Every door is barr'd with gold, and opens but to golden keys.
Every gate is throng'd with suitors, all the markets overflow.
When the ranks are roll'd in vapour, and the winds are laid with sound. I will turn that earlier page. There the common sense of most shall hold a fretful realm in awe, And the kindly earth shall slumber, lapt in universal law. Yet I doubt not thro' the ages one increasing purpose runs, And the thoughts of men are widen'd with the process of the suns. 140 Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers, and I linger on the shore, And the individual withers, and the world is more and more.