Classic Poem

'Twould seem there's some affinity between
Beauty and rectitude. We cannot sway
From truth and virtue but it draws a screen
Over the face of day:

The blue sky blurr'd, and earth's refreshing green,
With hill and dale and cattle-haunted fords,
All dead and hollow as the ochred scene
Round the dramatic boards.

The flowers shut up their wonder from our eyes,
Their beauty that enchanted us; and books
Refuse to give the deeper sense that lies
Reveal'd to virtuous looks.

A soul of artless purity discerns
Poetic wreathings in prosaic facts,
And finds that universal Nature turns
To beauty all her acts.

To perfect purity—if such could be—
This earth were all transparent, the dull clod—
In which we neither life nor beauty see—
Breathing the living God.

Beauty of nature through the varied year,
Beauty of truth, of right, of form, of soul—
All beauty is of God—one atmosphere
That permeates the whole.

Let beauty cease to be our daily food,
We lose the finer sense of truth and right:
Forsake the holy paths of rectitude,
And beauty suffers blight.