Page:Songs from the Southern Seas and Other Poems (1873).djvu/152

148 A sculptor once a granite statue made,
 * One-sided only, just to fit its place:

The unseen side was monstrous; so men shade
 * Their evil acts behind a smiling face.

O blind! O foolish! thus our sins to hide,
 * And force our pleading hearts the gall to sip;

O cowards! who must eat the myrrh, that Pride
 * May smile like Virtue with a lying lip.

A sin admitted is nigh half atoned;
 * And while the fault is red and freshly done,

If we but drop our eyes and think,—'tis owned,-
 * 'Tis half forgiven, half the crown is won.

But if we heedless let it reek and rot,
 * Then pile a mountain on its grave, and turn.

With smiles to all the world,—that tainted spot
 * Beneath the mound will never cease to burn.