C.D. Warner, et al., comp. The Library of the World’s Best Literature.
An Anthology in Thirty Volumes. 1917.

The Noble Nature

IT is not growing like a tree

In bulk doth make man better be;

Or standing long an oak, three hundred year,

To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sere;

A lily of a day

Is fairer far in May,

Although it fall and die that night:

It was the plant and flower of Light,

In small proportions we just beauties see;

And in short measures life may perfect be.