Poems (Hardy)/Browning
BROWNING
1860
MEN said there were no ways that they could climb The mountain some could see. Nay, more, they said,— Beholding as through mist its veilèd head,—It was no mountain, but a cloud; or timeWould prove it but a barren, unsublime, And cheerless country; neither grain for bread, Nor in its purlieus, bloom for honey spread;Not order but confusion all its rime.
1890
But now it is men's joy to find twelve ways To one clear spot; and yet to find too dim No shade, no bough vociferant with leavesUpon the mountain. Ay, they haste to praise The clouds they see on the horizon's rim, Where, sovereign and serene, the great cone cleaves.