Richard Henry Horne

“ Enormous sea-weeds, strombites, and whitening bones,
Submarine flowers that lift their welcoming heads,
And wail of starv'd birds echoing to the moon,
Now slowly rising from her daily grave,
Profusely furnish funeral honours due
To those whose life-lamps burnt in caves, like mine.
Young man! forbear thy touch!—thy tearful voice—
Begone at once! behold the waves flow near,
And soon will kiss these pale and paralyzed feet.
The crescent points creep round with gushing gleams,
And now they eddying meet, and deepening flow! ”

“ Tow'rds higher knowledge;—and his Chair devolved
On me, though others to that lofty seat
Held worthier claim. As Polygnotus' hand
In paintings illustrated godlike forms,
And acts of heroes, so did I but teach,
With humbler, but not less devoted powers,
What godlike minds had imaged. Let that pass
From me, the medium of those truths sublime,
To rest as crowns for their diviner brows. ”

“ But 'tis poor earthliness large gains to crave,
Thanks, and prompt recognition from the world
Of service and self-sacrifice. Enough—
Man knows his own acts, his own secret mind,—
Evades, or all the mingled truths confronts.
'Leave me, young man; the tide is rising fast!
Good youth, retire—'tis now my will to die.
Studies and hardships on extreme age piling
Weight upon weight, life's arches are borne down ”