Classic Poem

FOR THE ANNIVERSARY OF THE ROYAL BRITISH SYSTEM OF EDUCATION ,

HELD AT FREEMASONS' HALL, MAY 16, 1812.

The lion, o'er his wild domains,
Rules with the terror of his eye;
The eagle of the rock maintains
By force his empire in the sky;
The shark, the tyrant of the flood,
Reigns through the deep with quenchless rage:
Parent and young, unwean'd from blood,
Are still the same from age to age.

Of all that live, and move, and breathe,
Man only rises o'er his birth;
He looks above, around, beneath,
At once the heir of heaven and earth:
Force, cunning, speed, which Nature gave
The various tribes throughouTher plan,
Life to enjoy, from death to save, —
These are the lowest powers of Man.

From strength to strength he travels on:
He leaves the lingering brute behind;
And when a few short years are gone,
He soars, a disembodied mind:
Beyond the grave, his course sublime
Destined through nobler paths to run,
In his career the end of Time
Is but Eternity begun.

What guides him in his high pursuit,
Opens, illumines, cheers his way,
Discerns the immortal from the brute,
God's image from the mould of clay?
'Tis Knowledge: — Knowledge to the soul
Is power, and liberty, and peace;
And while celestial ages roll,
The joys of Knowledge shall increase.

Hail! to the glorious plan, that spread
The light with universal beams,
And through the human desert led
Truth's living, pure, perpetual streams.
— Behold a new creation rise,
New spirit breathed into the clod,
Where'er the voice of Wisdom cries,
" Man, know thyself, and fear thy God. "