Classic Poem

If those things always their own use invite,
That yield us profit, and secure delight,
What shall we owe this last work of your pen,
Which, more than when you steer'd the souls of men
With your harmonious scenes, and graceful dress,
Doth now a power above that art express?
For, while you seem to stoop, you gently raise
Children into ability to praise,
And make them men, who by your skilful hand
Taught, do both nimbly move and learn to stand.
Most other Grammars to our youth impart
A caustic, dry, and nugatory art,
Which they go to, as coldly as young men
Make love to one of fourscore years and ten.
'Twas a prodigious music, that did call
Huge stones to build themselves a Theban wall:
We may believe that miracle, who see
You have fil'd rocks into a gallery,
And all those rugged cliffs, that threaten'd youth
In their approach, are by your verse made smooth,
And Grammar pourtray'd with a smiling face,
Is now no more a Fury, but a Grace.