13 No gadding itch e'er spurred her to delight
In needless sallies; none but civil care
Of friendly correspondence could invite
Her out of doors; unless she 'pointed were
By visitations from Heaven's hand, where she
Might make her own in tender sympathy.
14 Abroad, she counted but her prison: home,
Home was the region of her liberty.
Abroad diverson thronged, and left no room
For zeal's set task, and virtue's business free:
Home was her less encumbered scene, though there
Angels and gods she knew spectators were.
* * * * *
15 This weaned her heart from things below,
And kindled it with strong desire to gain
Her hope's high aim. Life could no longer now
Flatter her love, or make her prayers refrain
From begging, yet with humble resignation,
To be dismissed from her mortal station.
16 Oh, how she welcomed her courteous pain,
And languished with most serene content!
No paroxysms could make her once complain,
Nor suffered she her patience to be spent
Before her life; contriving thus to yield
To her disease, and yet not lose the field.
17 This trying furnace wasted day by day
(What she herself had always counted dross)
Her mortal mansion, which so ruined lay,
That of the goodly fabric nothing was
Remaining now, but skin and bone; refined
Together were her body and her mind.
18 At length the fatal hour—sad hour to me!—
Released the longing soul: no ejulation
Tolled her knell; no dying agony
Frowned in her death; but in that lamb-like fashion
In which she lived ('O righteous heaven!' said I,
Who closed her dear eyes,) she had leave to die.
19 O ever-precious soul! yet shall that flight
Of thine not snatch thee from thy wonted nest:
Here shalt thou dwell, here shalt thou live in spite
Of any death—here in this faithful breast.
Unworthy 'tis, I know, by being mine;
Yet nothing less, since long it has been thine.
20 Accept thy dearer portraiture, which I
Have on my other Psyche fixed here;
Since her ideal beauties signify
The truth of thine: as for her spots, they are
Thy useful foil, and shall inservient be
But to enhance and more illustrate thee.