Classic Poem

Religion too, by providential voice,
May have, so early, trained us in her lore:—
Truth may, so soon, have shewn the wiser choice
Which the devoted Mary made of yore;—
Have drawn us, spite of all earth had in store,
“To th' better cause,” that we, quite exorcised,
May, from our earliest years, have given o'er
All mortal strife, and nothing else have prized
Save that “pearl” for which all is cheaply sacrificed.