One of the excerpts from 'Occasional Poems'
John Godfrey Saxe. included in his 'Complete Poems'.
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 neighbors 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 humor run
In vain endeavor 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,
'T is well to borrow from the good and great;
'T is wise to learn; 't is godlike to create!
IN THE LIBRARY.
Clinton Scollard. From 'With Reed and Lyre.'
1886.
From the oriels one by one,
Slowly fades the setting sun;
On the marge of afternoon
Stands the new-born crescent moon.
In the twilight's crimson glow
Dim the quiet alcoves grow.
Drowsy-lidded Silence smiles
On the long deserted aisles;
Out of every shadowy nook
Spirit faces seem to look.
Some with smiling eyes, and some
With a sad entreaty dumb;
He who shepherded his sheep
On the wild Sicilian steep,
He above whose grave are set
Sprays of Roman violet;
Poets, sages—all who wrought
In the crucible of thought.
Day by day as seasons glide
On the great eternal tide,
Noiselessly they gather thus
In the twilight beauteous,
Hold communion each with each,
Closer than our earthly speech,
Till within the east are born
Premonitions of the morn!
THE BOOK-HUNTER.
Frank Dempster Sherman. From the 'Century Magazine,'
November, 1885.