Arthur Hugh Clough - Seven Sonnets IV lyrics

But if, as (not by what the soul desired Swayed in the judgment) wisest men have thought, And (furnishing the evidence it sought) Man's heart hath ever fervently required, And story, for that reason deemed inspired, To every clime, in every age, hath taught; If in this human complex there be aught Not lost in d**h, as not in birth acquired, O then, though cold the lips that did convey Rich freights of meaning, dead each living sphere Where thought abode and fancy loved to play, Thou, yet we think, somewhere somehow still art, And satisfied with that the patient heart The where and how doth not desire to hear.