The Blind Summit

So mounts the child of ages of desire,
Man, up the steeps of Thought; and would behold
Yet purer peaks, touched with unearthlier fire,
In sudden prospect virginally new;
But on the lone last height he sighs: "'Tis cold,
And clouds shut out the view."

Ah, doom of mortals! Vexed with phantoms old,
Old phantoms that waylay us and pursue,--
Weary of dreams,--we think to see unfold
The eternal landscape of the Real and True;
And on our Pisgah can but write: "'Tis cold,
And clouds shut out the view."