Look whoso will to these; as in a glass,
To inform thy fancy see earth's pageants pass:
The freshness and the glory, and, alas!

The inconstancy named Greece. Or she who came
To daunt the centuries with all-potent name,
And made Dominion's purport Rome. But frame

Here thy desire, and Cleopatra's grace
Confronts thee; or the inspired Silenus face, —
Plato's dear oracle of the market-place.

If thou wilt listen rightly, thou mayst hear
The horn of Roland sounding; or the cheer
That hailed the pipes at Lucknow; or more clear.

Than ever music was by mortals made,
Thou mayst take the strain by Thracian Orpheus played
Amid the world of shades, himself a shade.

For all the wondrous forms that poets feign
No less of potency for joy or pain
Possess, than that which was. Then once again

For thee the exiled Florentine shall tread
The ghastly regions of the unholy dead;
For thee the Table Round again is spread,

And Galahad once more renews his quest.
Thou shalt hear Hamlet's doubting, Sancho's jest,
Or the reverberating curses from the breast.

Of fallen Satan. These, and far more than they,
Will awe, instruct, delight, correct, allay
Thy dull distemper, charm thy dole away.