Our life henceforth is one eternal Now,
Based on the Past, with all it has achieved,
And looking to the Future with a brow
Beaming with keen anticipation's glow;
However in the past we may have grieved,
Now comes a state where grief is all unknown;
We rise above the brutal plane, relieved
From its relentless rule; we gladly own
Affection's sweeter sway, and ever cease to moan.
41.
As the conditions change, we rise to higher
Enjoyment of the life which they unfold;
We are not torn by false or vain desire,
Nor tortured with the slow but cleansing fire
That burns the dross and purifies the gold;
But calmly and serenely on we keep
Our course to beauties and to joys untold;
No more our eyes are called upon to weep,
No more we sink in dull and all-unconscious sleep.
42.
Our life, as then we find it, still unfolds
Through the resistless tide or undertow
Of an involuntary force, which holds
Us in the true unerring course—controls
The flow of voluntary, as below,
Yet gives a sense of acting from free will;
But well we know the power to will must flow,
With all our opportunities, from still
Profounder prior source, whence we derive all skill.
43.
'Twas always so, and will be without end;
We cannot pierce eternity of Past
To find beginning, nor the future rend
To find the final goal to which we tend,
But be content to know that, first and last,
All was and will be as we find it now,
Changed only in condition, which is fast
Revolving the kaleidoscope to show
How multiform the Being first on earth we know.
44.
Mankind are Gods in embryo, and Gods
Are wedded Pairs advanced to higher life;
All are one substance, and the seeming odds
Are in conditions; he who patient plods
Through this dull sphere of ever-active strife,
Where hope and doubt a balance keep with fears,
Will one day join his true allotted wife,
And they together rise, as blend their spheres,
To God's estate and its unfolding lapse of years.