Because that hate would prove his greater foe.
’Tis hard for them (yet who so loudly boast
Good-will to men?) to love their dearest friend;
For may not he invade their good supreme,
Where the least jealousy turns love to gall?
All shines to them, that for a season shines. 1200
Each act, each thought, he questions, “What its weight,
Its colour what, a thousand ages hence?”— 1202
And what it there appears, he deems it now.
Hence, pure are the recesses of his soul.