Thomas Humphry Ward, ed. The English Poets. 1880–1918.rnVol. IV. The Nineteenth Century: Wordsworth to Rossetti

Arthur Hugh Clough (1819–1861)

‘Perchè Pensa? Pensando s’invecchia’

TO spend uncounted years of pain,

Again, again, and yet again,

In working out in heart and brain

The problem of our being here;

To gather facts from far and near,

Upon the mind to hold them clear,

And, knowing more may yet appear,

Unto one’s latest breath to fear

The premature result to draw—

Is this the object, end and law,

And purpose of our being here?