There is more of the ideal in it.
MIMNERMUS IN CHURCH You promise heavens free from strife, Pure truth, and perfect change of will; But sweet, sweet is this human life, So sweet, I fain would breathe it still; Your chilly stars I can forego, This warm kind world is all I know.
You say there is no substance here, One great reality above: Back from that void I shrink in fear And child-like hide myself in love; Show me what angels feel.

Till then I cling, a mere weak man, to men.
You bid me lift my mean desires From faltering lips and fitful veins To sexless souls, ideal choirs, Unwearied voices, wordless strains; My mind with fonder welcome owns One dear dead friend's remembered tones.
Forsooth the present we must give To that which cannot pass away; All beauteous things for which we live By laws of time and space decay.
But oh, the very reason why I clasp them, is because they die.
The preacher has been talking to his congregation about the joys of Heaven.

There, he says, there will be no quarrelling, no contest, no falsehood, and all evil dispositions will be entirely changed to good.

The poet answers, "This world and this life are full of beauty and of joy for me.

I do not want to die, I want to live.