The Lantern

Book 451

PG

Even there the houghs will sag and loose their powers.

Again, sleep follows after food, because

The food produces same result as air,

Whilst being scattered round through all the veins;

And much the heaviest is that slumber which,

Full or fatigued, thou takest; since 'tis then

That the most bodies disarrange themselves,

Bruised by labours hard. And in same wise,

This three-fold change: a forcing of the soul

Down deeper, more a casting-forth of it,

A moving more divided in its parts

And scattered more.

And to whate'er pursuit

A man most clings absorbed, or what the affairs

On which we theretofore have tarried much,

And mind hath strained upon the more, we seem

In sleep not rarely to go at the same.

The lawyers seem to plead and cite decrees,

Commanders they to fight and go at frays,

Sailors to live in combat with the winds,

And we ourselves indeed to make this book,

And still to seek the nature of the world

And set it down, when once discovered, here

In these my country's leaves. Thus all pursuits,

All arts in general seem in sleeps to mock