Touch us gently, Time!
Let us glide adown thy stream
Gently,—as we sometimes glide
Through a quiet dream.

Touch us gently, Time, reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919). Compare "Time has touched me gently in his race, And left no odious furrows in my face", George Crabbe, Tales of the Hall, Book xvii., The Widow.