Ii

What though this ancient Earth be trod No more by step of Demi-god Mounting from glorious deed to deed As thou from clime to clime didst lead; Yet still, the bosom beating high, And the hushed farewell of an eye Where no procrastinating gaze A last infirmity betrays, Prove that thy heaven-descended sway Shall ne'er submit to cold decay. By thy divinity impelled, The Stripling seeks the tented field; The aspiring Virgin kneels; and, pale With awe, receives the hallowed veil, A soft and tender Heroine Vowed to severer discipline; Inflamed by thee, the blooming Boy Makes of the whistling shrouds a toy, And of the ocean's dismal breast A play-ground,--or a couch of rest; 'Mid the blank world of snow and ice, Thou to his dangers dost enchain The Chamois-chaser awed in vain By chasm or dizzy precipice; And hast Thou not with triumph seen How soaring Mortals glide between Or through the clouds, and brave the light With bolder than Icarian flight? How they, in bells of crystal, dive-- Where winds and waters cease to strive-- For no unholy visitings, Among the monsters of the Deep; And all the sad and precious things Which there in ghastly silence sleep? Or, adverse tides and currents headed, And breathless calms no longer dreaded, In never-slackening voyage go Straight as an arrow from the bow; And, slighting sails and scorning oars, Keep faith with Time on distant shores? --Within our fearless reach are placed The secrets of the burning Waste; Egyptian tombs unlock their dead, Nile trembles at his fountain head; Thou speak'st--and lo! the polar Seas Unbosom their last mysteries. --But oh! what transports, what sublime reward, Won from the world of mind, dost thou prepare For philosophic Sage; or high-souled Bard Who, for thy service trained in lonely woods, Hath fed on pageants floating through the air, Or calentured in depth of limpid floods; Nor grieves--tho' doomed thro' silent night to bear The domination of his glorious themes, Or struggle in the net-work of thy dreams!