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| THE HUMAN heart has hidden treasures, | |
| In secret kept, in silence sealed; | |
| The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures, | |
| Whose charms were broken if revealed. | |
| And days may pass in gay confusion, | 5 |
| And nights in rosy riot fly, | |
| While, lost in Fame’s or Wealth’s illusion, | |
| The memory of the Past may die. | |
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| But there are hours of lonely musing, | |
| Such as in evening silence come, | 10 |
| When, soft as birds their pinions closing, | |
| The heart’s best feelings gather home. | |
| Then in our souls there seems to languish | |
| A tender grief that is not woe, | |
| And thoughts that once wrung groans of anguish, | 15 |
| Now cause but some mild tears to flow. | |
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| And feelings, once as strong as passions, | |
| Float softly back—a faded dream; | |
| Our own sharp griefs and wild sensations, | |
| The tale of others’ sufferings seem, | 20 |
| Oh! when the heart is freshly bleeding, | |
| How longs it for that time to be, | |
| When, through the mist of years receding, | |
| Its woes but live in reverie! | |
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| And it can dwell on moonlight glimmer, | 25 |
| On evening shade and loneliness; | |
| And, while the sky grows dim and dimmer, | |
| Feel no untold and strange distress— | |
| Only a deeper impulse given, | |
| By lonely hour and darkened room, | 30 |
| To solemn thoughts that soar to heaven | |
| Seeking a life and world to come. | |
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