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I / The world is full of orphans: firstly, those / Who are so in the strict sense of the phrase / (But many a lonely tree the loftier grows / Than others crowded in the forest's maze); / The next are such as are not doomed to lose / Their tender parents in their budding days, / But merely their parental tenderness, / Which leaves them orphans of the heart no less.
II / The next are 'only children', as they are styled, / Who grow up children only, since the old saw / Pronounces that an 'only' 's a spoilt child. / But not to go too far, I hold it law / That where their education, harsh or mild, / 'Transgresses the great bounds of love or awe, / The sufferers, be't in heart or intellect, / Whate'er the cause are orphans in effect.