Page:Poems - Tennyson (1843) - Volume 2 of 2.djvu/237

⁠"Fill the cup, and fill the can!
⁠Mingle madness, mingle scorn!
⁠Dregs of life, and lees of man:
⁠Yet we will not die forlorn."

The voice grew faint: there came a further change;
Again arose the mystic mountain-range:
Below were men and horses pierced with worms,
And slowly quickening into lower forms;
By shards and scurf of salt, and scum of dross,
Old plash of rains, and refuse patch'd with moss.
Then some one spake: "Behold! it was a crime
Of sense avenged by sense that wore with time."
Another said: "The crime of sense became
The crime of malice, and is equal blame."
And one: "He had not wholly quench'd his power;
A little grain of conscience made him sour."
At last I heard a voice upon the slope,
Cry to the summit, "Is there any hope?"