"The infinite echoes hid in each.
And Virgil! shade of Mantuan beech
Did help the shade of bay to reach
"And knit around his forehead high!—
For his gods wore less majesty
Than his brown bees humm'd deathlessly.
"Lucretius—nobler than his mood!
Who dropp'd his plummet down the broad
Deep universe, and said 'No God,'
"Finding no bottom. He denied
Divinely the divine, and died
Chief poet on the Tiber-side,
"By grace of God. His face is stern,
As one compell'd, in spite of scorn,
To teach a truth he could not learn.
"And Ossian, dimly seen or guess'd!
Once counted greater than the rest,
When mountain-winds blew out his vest.
"And Spenser droop'd his dreaming head
(With languid sleep-smile you had said
From his own verse engendered)
"On Ariosto's, till they ran
Their locks in one!—The Italian
Shot nimbler heat of bolder man
"From his fine lids. And Dante stern
And sweet, whose spirit was an urn
For wine and milk pour'd out in turn.
"And Goethe—with that reaching eye
His soul reach'd out from far and high,
And fell from inner entity.