No More Learning

"Canst thou desire or pie or puff?
Thy well-bred manners were enough,
Without such gross material stuff. "

"Yet well-bred men," he faintly said,
"Are not willing to be fed:
Nor are they well without the bread. "

Her visage scorched him ere she spoke:
"There are," she said, "a kind of folk
Who have no horror of a joke.

"Such wretches live: they take their share
Of common earth and common air:
We come across them here and there:

"We grant them--there is no escape--
A sort of semi-human shape
Suggestive of the man-like Ape. "

"In all such theories," said he,
"One fixed exception there must be.
That is, the Present Company. "

Baffled, she gave a wolfish bark:
He, aiming blindly in the dark,
With random shaft had pierced the mark.

She felt that her defeat was plain,
Yet madly strove with might and main
To get the upper hand again.

Fixing her eyes upon the beach,
As though unconscious of his speech,
She said "Each gives to more than each. "

He could not answer yea or nay:
He faltered "Gifts may pass away. "
Yet knew not what he meant to say.

"If that be so," she straight replied,
"Each heart with each doth coincide.
What boots it? For the world is wide.
"

[Picture: He faltered "Gifts may pass away"]

"The world is but a Thought," said he:
"The vast unfathomable sea
Is but a Notion--unto me. "

And darkly fell her answer dread
Upon his unresisting head,
Like half a hundredweight of lead.

"The Good and Great must ever shun
That reckless and abandoned one
Who stoops to perpetrate a pun.

"The man that smokes--that reads the _Times_--
That goes to Christmas Pantomimes--
Is capable of _any_ crimes! "

He felt it was his turn to speak,
And, with a shamed and crimson cheek,
Moaned "This is harder than Bezique! "

But when she asked him "Wherefore so? "
He felt his very whiskers glow,
And frankly owned "I do not know. "

[Picture: This is harder than Bezique! ]

While, like broad waves of golden grain,
Or sunlit hues on cloistered pane,
His colour came and went again.

Pitying his obvious distress,
Yet with a tinge of bitterness,
She said "The More exceeds the Less. "

"A truth of such undoubted weight,"
He urged, "and so extreme in date,
It were superfluous to state. "

Roused into sudden passion, she
In tone of cold malignity:
"To others, yea: but not to thee. "

But when she saw him quail and quake,
And when he urged "For pity's sake! "
Once more in gentle tones she spake.

"Thought in the mind doth still abide
That is by Intellect supplied,
And within that Idea doth hide:

"And he, that yearns the truth to know,
Still further inwardly may go,
And find Idea from Notion flow:

"And thus the chain, that sages sought,
Is to a glorious circle wrought,
For Notion hath its source in Thought. "

So passed they on with even pace:
Yet gradually one might trace
A shadow growing on his face.