Gently with A, now—in the Lesser Third!)

XII

Of all the lamentable debts incurred

By Man through buying knowledge, this were worst:

That he should find his last gain prove his first

Was futile—merely nescience absolute,

Not knowledge in the bud which holds a fruit

Haply undreamed of in the soul's Spring-tide,

Pursed in the petals Summer opens wide,

And Autumn, withering, rounds to perfect ripe,—