Page:The first and last journeys of Thoreau - lately discovered among his unpublished journals and manuscripts.djvu/131

 and whimsicalities; hammering away at his subject, be it eulogy or epitaph, sonnet or satire, with the patience of a day-laborer, without the least taste, but with an occasional fine distinction and poetic utterance of a high order. He was rather Doctor Donne than the poet Donne. He gropes for the most part. His letters are perhaps best.

Lovelace is what his name expresses,—of slight material to make a poet's fame. His goings and comings are of no great account. His taste is not so much love of the good as fear of the bad, though, in one or two instances, he has written fearlessly and memorably.

Tuesday, October 24.

Though I am old enough to have discovered that the dreams of youth are not to be realized in this state of existence, yet I think it would be the next greatest happiness always to be allowed to look under the eyelids of Time and contemplate the Perfect steadily, with the clear understanding that I do not attain to it. [83]