To many seemed superfluous; as no cause

For such exalted confidence could e’er

Exist; so, none is now for such despair.

The two extremes are equally remote

From truth and reason; do not, then, confound

One with the other, but reject them both;

And choose the middle point, whereon to build

Sound expectations. This doth he advise

Who shared at first the illusion. At this day,

When a Tartarian darkness overspreads