Moderate tasks and moderate leisure,
Quiet living, strict-kept measure
Both in suffering and in pleasure,—
⁠'Tis for this thy nature yearns.

But so many books thou readest,
But so many schemes thou breedest,
But so many wishes feedest,
⁠That thy poor head almost turns.

And (the world's so madly jangled,
Human things so fast entangled)
Nature's wish must now be strangled
⁠For that best which she discerns.

So it must be! yet, while leading
A strained life, while over-feeding,
Like the rest, his wit with reading,
⁠No small profit that man earns,—

​Who through all he meets can steer him,
Can reject what cannot clear him,
Cling to what can truly cheer him;
⁠Who each day more surely learns

That an impulse, from the distance
Of his deepest, best existence,
To the words, "Hope, Light, Persistence,"
⁠Strongly sets and truly burns.