William Cullen Bryant — Mutation

They talk of short-lived pleasure–be it so–      Pain dies as quickly: stern, hard-featured pain Expires, and lets her weary prisoner go.      The fiercest agonies have shortest reign;      And after dreams of horror, comes again The welcome morning with its rays of peace.       Oblivion, softly wiping out the stain, Makes the strong secret pangs of shame to cease: Remorse is virtue’s root; its fair increase       Are fruits of innocence and blessedness: Thus joy, o’erborne and bound, doth still release       His young limbs from the chains that round him press. Weep not that the world changes–did it keep A stable, changeless state, ’twere cause indeed to weep.