Page:The Battle of the Books, and Other Short Pieces.djvu/131

 The detestation you express For vice in all its glittering dress: That patience under torturing pain, Where stubborn stoics would complain. Must these like empty shadows pass, Or forms reflected from a glass? Or mere chimæras in the mind, That fly, and leave no marks behind? Does not the body thrive and grow By food of twenty years ago? And, had it not been still supplied, It must a thousand times have died. Then, who with reason can maintain That no effects of food remain? And, is not virtue in mankind The nutriment that feeds the mind? Upheld by each good action past, And still continued by the last: Then, who with reason can pretend That all effects of virtue end? Believe me, Stella, when you show That true contempt for things below, Nor prize your life for other ends Than merely to oblige your friends, Your former actions claim their part, And join to fortify your heart. For virtue in her daily race, Like Janus, bears a double face.