Classic Poem

Here, e'en the sturdy democrat may find,
Nor scorn their rank, the nobles of the mind;
While kings may learn, nor blush at being shown,
How Learning's patents abrogate their own.
A goodly company and fair to see;
Royal plebeians; earls of low degree;
Beggars whose wealth enriches every clime;
Princes who scarce can boast a mental dime;
Crowd here together like the quaint array
Of jostling neighbours on a market day.
Homer and Milton, — can we call them blind? —
Of godlike sight, the vision of the mind;
Shakspere, who calmly looked creation through,
" Exhausted worlds, and then imagined new;"
Plato the sage, so thoughtful and serene,
He seems a prophet by his heavenly mien;
Shrewd Socrates, whose philosophic power
Xantippe proved in many a trying hour;
And Aristophanes, whose humour run
In vain endeavour to be- " cloud" the sun;
Majestic Æschylus, whose glowing page
Holds half the grandeur of the Athenian stage;
Pindar, whose odes, replete with heavenly fire,
Proclaim the master of the Grecian lyre;
Anacreon, famed for many a luscious line
Devote to Venus and the god of wine.

I love vast libraries; yet there is a doubt
If one be better with them or without, —
Unless he use them wisely, and indeed,
Knows the high art of what and how to read.
At learning's fountain it is sweet to drink,
But 'tis a nobler privilege to think;
And oft from books apart, the thirsting mind
May make the nectar which it cannot find,
'Tis well to borrow from the good and great;
'Tis wise to learn; 'tis godlike to create!