Past and Future
Past is the past! But no, it is not past,
In us, in us, it quickens, wants, aspires;
And on our hearts the unknown dead have cast
The hunger and the thirst of their desires.
Unknown the pangs, the peace we too prepare!
What shakes this bosom shall reverberate
Through ages unconceived: in that deep lair
The unguessed, unhoped, undreaded issues wait.
Our pregnant acts are all unprophesied.
We dream sublime conclusions; destine, plan,
Build and unbuild; yet turn no jot aside
The something infinite that moves in Man.
We write The End where fate has scarce begun;
And no man knows the thing that he has done.
