Classic Poem

If this be but a house whose stone we place,
Better the prayer unbreathed, the music mute
Ere it be stifled in the rifted lute;
Better had been withheld those hands of grace,
Undreamed the dream that was this moment's base
Through visioned nights that did the days refute.
Accursed the fig-tree if it bear no fruit.
Only the flower sanctifies the vase.

No, 'tis a temple—where the mind may kneel
And worship Beauty changeless and divine;
Where the sage Past may consecrate the stole
Of Truth's new priest, the Future; where the peal
Of organ voices down the human line
Shall sound the diapason of the soul.