Page:Landon in Literary Gazette 1832.pdf/13

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And herein have the green trees and the blossoming shrubs their advantage over us: the flower withers and the leaf falls, but the fertilising sap still lingers in their veins, and the following years bring again a spring of promise and a summer of beauty: but we, when our leaves and flowers perish, they perish utterly; we put forth no new hopes, we dream no new dreams. Why are we not wise enough, at least more preciously to retain their memory?

! the hours! the happy hours Of our other earlier time, When the world was full of flowers, And the sky a summer clime! All life seem'd so lovely then; For it mirror'd our own heart: Life is only joyful when That joy of ourselves is part.

Fond delight and kind deceit Are the gladness of the young— For the bloom beneath our feet Is what we ourselves have flung. Then so many pleasures seem Scatter'd o'er our onward way; 'Tis so difficult to deem How their relish will decay.

What the heart now beats to win Soon will be unloved, unsought: Gradual is the change within, But an utter change is wrought. Time goes on, and time destroys Not the joy, but our delight: Do we now desire the toys Which so charm'd our childhood's sight?