Perchance the law some Giver hath: Let be! let be! what canst thou know? A myriad races came and went; this Sphinx hath seen them come and go.

Haply the Law that rules the world allows to man the widest range; And haply Fate’s a Theist-word, subject to human chance and change.

This “I” may find a future Life, a nobler copy of our own, Where every riddle shall be ree’d, where every knowledge shall be known;

Where ’twill be man’s to see the whole of what on Earth he sees in part; Where change shall ne’er surcharge the thought; nor hope defer’d shall hurt the heart.

But!—faded flow’er and fallen leaf no more shall deck the parent tree; And man once dropt by Tree of Life what hope of other life has he?