Silvern

But, leaving novelists alone, on the whole we find in real life that if speech is silvern, silence is essentially golden, and that more harm is done by saying too much than by saying too little; above all, that infinite mischief arises by not letting sleeping dogs lie.

I know a pool, where shadows fall From fir-trees, melancholy tall, That dream and quiver round the rim, And in the molten centre swim, Where taper tops do all unite Bemirrored in its silvern light.