"Love is a path to virtue for the brave"
Love is a path to virtue for the brave
Led by the beautiful; a great desire
In souls that are not perfect, but aspire
After perfection; a high hope to save
The noble heart from world-stains that deprave
Its purity, to lift it from the mire
And cleanse it through with agony and fire
Fit for a new life entered through the grave.
For even where no hero sheds his blood
The young tree suffers to produce the bud,
The parent through the offspring withereth:
And where no sweet soul bleeds to death in song
The body's pangs the bodily life prolong,
And birth is to the mother a sweet death