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And presently I found That, just as ugliness had withered, so unwound Itself, and perished off, repugnance to what wrong Might linger yet i' the make of man. My will was strong I' the matter; I could pick and choose, project my weight: (Remember how we saw the boatman trim his freight!) Determine to observe, or manage to escape, Or make divergency assume another shape By shift of point of sight in me the observer: thus Corrected, added to, subtracted from,--discuss Each variant quality, and brute-beast touch was turned Into mankind's safeguard! Force, guile, were arms which earned My praise, not blame at all: for we must learn to live, Case-hardened at all points, not bare and sensitive, But plated for defence, nay, furnished for attack, With spikes at the due place, that neither front nor back May suffer in that squeeze with nature, we find--life. Are we not here to learn the good of peace through strife, Of love through hate, and reach knowledge by ignorance? Why, those are helps thereto, which late we eyed askance, And nicknamed unaware! Just so, a sword we call Superfluous, and cry out against, at festival: Wear it in time of war, its clink and clatter grate O' the ear to purpose then!