Robert Browning – from Paracelsus

This is my plan–(first drinking its good luck)–
I will accept all helps; all I despised
So rashly at the outset, equally
With early impulses, late years have quenched:
I have tried each way singly: now for both!
All helps! no one sort shall exclude the rest.
I seek to know and to enjoy at once,
Not one without the other as before.
Suppose my labour should seem God’s own cause
Once more, as first I dreamed,–it shall not baulk me
Of the meanest earthliest sensualest delight
That may be snatched; for every joy is gain,
And gain is gain, however small. My soul
Can die then, nor be taunted–“what was gained?”
Nor, on the other hand, should pleasure follow
As though I had not spurned her hitherto,
Shall she o’ercloud my spirit’s rapt communion
With the tumultuous past, the teeming future,
Glorious with visions of a full success.

…

After all, Festus, you say well: I am
A man yet: I need never humble me.
I would have been–something, I know not what;
But though I cannot soar, I do not crawl.
There are worse portions than this one of mine.
You say well!