Analysis of Egoism.

Not as mine their thoughts who pass:
Each has his life's looking-glass
Limning therein the light and shade
His own entity has made.
I have my life's vision still
Coloured for me, good or ill,
And my point of view must be
But my own immortally.
Could I guess at theirs, or know
What shapes in their vision go.
Lift the veil by day and night
That's laid on another's light, —
They might with a fancy free
Get, too, at the gist of me,
And with a plebeian shout
Turn the Gods I worship out,
To be in a concourse lewd
Jeered at by the multitude,
While I with a reeling brain
Talked with Demons in the fane!