Can it be, and must, and will it?
Silence! Out of fact's domain,
Just surmise prepared to mutter hope, and also fear—dispute
Fact's inexorable ruling, "Outside fact, surmise be mute!"
Well!
Ay, well and best, if fact's self I may force the answer from!
'T is surmise I stop the mouth of! Not above in yonder dome
All a rapture with its rose-glow,—not around, where pile and peak
Strainingly await the sun's fall,—not beneath, where crickets creak,
Birds assemble for their bedtime, soft the treetop swell subsides,—