The Blind Summit

[A Viennese gentleman, who had climbed the Hoch-König
without a guide, was found dead, in a sitting posture, near the
summit, upon which he had written, 'It is cold, and clouds shut
out the view.'-
Vide
the
Daily News
of September 10, 1891.]

So mounts the child of ages of desire,
Man, up the steeps of Thought; and would behold
Yet purer peaks, touched with unearthlier fire,
In sudden prospect virginally new;
But on the lone last height he sighs: ''Tis cold,
And clouds shut out the view.'

Ah, doom of mortals! Vexed with phantoms old,
Old phantoms that waylay us and pursue,-
Weary of dreams,-we think to see unfold
The eternal landscape of the Real and True;
And on our Pisgah can but write: ''Tis cold,
And clouds shut out the view.'