For thou art worthy, Seric Socrates,
Of the bright robe, and that fair coronet,
Meed of true goodness, on thy forehead set,
Worthy to walk in equal bliss with these
Thy peers, in Hades' dreamy valley met;
For thine were pure and patriot services,
High worth, and generous love of doing good,
Gilding the darkness of a barbarous clime
That paid thee wages of ingratitude,
After the Balaam cunning of a foe
Had drown'd thine efforts in adulterous crime,
For righteous weal exchanging sinful woe:
Witness, ye spirits of the good and wise,
None recks of greatness till the great man dies.
De harp-controlling hymns! triumphant praise,
That heralded to his delighted home
The blushing victor of departed days
From Elis, or Nemæa, or the dome
Of sacred Delphi,—spirit-stirring songs,
Ev'n now your echoes linger on mine ears,
And to your Theban father still belongs
That name, time-honour'd twice a thousand years, King of the sounding lyre: nor alone
For music be thy praise, but for a heart
Strung with affections of deep-thrilling tone
And patriot feelings, that in lightning dart
Through the mute souls of all, with charm'd suspense Listening in love thy honied eloquence.
Sebere in simple virtue, nobly poor,
The guard alike and glory of all Greece
Through fierce invading war, and factious peace,
Model for youth, the temperate and pure,
Exemplar for old age, the just and good,
Athenian Aristides meekly stood
A thankless people's boast: thee-country's love
Warm'd with its holiest flame; thee-party spite
From hearth and home to bitter exile drove,
Envied for greatness: still, the patriot fight
Against the Mede beheld thee in the van
Doubly a victor, at the self-same hour
Crushing the foreign despot's giant power,
And conquering in thyself the pride of man.
Thou rock-bound and undying sacrifice,-
Ye fierce conspiring chieftains,—haggard queen,—
Thou parricide, convulsed with agonies,—
Ye furies, through the fearful darkness seen
Glaring with horrid eye and spectral mien,-
Appear, appear-for him, whose magic spell
From the dim void of intellectual night
Gave you dread being, terribly to tell
The shuddering world a master-spirit's might:
Yet thus alone not worthily nor well
Nor equal to a patriot-poet's praise
In black procession stalks gigantic crime;
To thee, great bard, their holier worship raise
Deep thoughts, high hopes, and symphonies sublime.
Olympia, with her festal multitude,
Beheld thy triumph first, in glad acclaim
Hailing thy nascent dawn of endless fame,
Eldest historian,-while Jove's sacred wood
And vocal statue sounded out thy name,
As gather'd Græcia's all of wise and good
Inscribed upon those modest narratives
The hallowed titles of the classic Nine:
For, sweet simplicity through every line,
With graphic phrase and talent, breathes and lives,— Truth, tolerance, pow'r, and patience, these are thine: And let not pedants to thy blame recall
That thy fresh mind such ready credence gives,
For thou art Charity, believing all.
Dust unto dust; the silver spinal cord
Shall soon be loosed; the forehead's golden bowl, That precious chalice for the wine of soul, Be shiver'd, and its treasure all outpour'd; The cell-stopt veins, that, as an emptying vase, Pour back upon the heart its weaken'd stream, Be shatter'd all; the circling wheel that draws From a strange cistern,-this corporeal frame,Moisture and increase, must be broken up; And with the shock we wake from life's dull dream : Still, oftentimes the wholesome bitter cup,
The glory, great physician, of thine art, Shall wondrously from ill-timed death redeem, Rallying the routed forces of the heart.
So might an angel weep, thou noble boy;
For, all unmixt with envy's duller flame,
Enthusiastic hope, and chivalrous joy
To note the calm historian's rising fame,
Glow'd at thy heart, and bade thee emulate
Those grand attempts, that honourable fate,
A brother, not a foe: years sped away,
And saw thee, still with patriot feelings warm,
A warrior-exile at thy Thracian farm,
Weaving the web of glory, day by day,
For Athens, that ingrate; thy manly pen
Eternal good for evil could repay,
For all prophetic was thy boldness, when
It writ thy works, an "heritage for aye."
Self-knowing, therefore humbled to the dust,
Self-curbing, therefore in a sensual age
Pure, patriotic, mild, religious, just,
Self-taught, yet moderate,-Athenian sage,
Albeit but faintly the recording page
Samples the precious harvest of thy brain,
Where Plato's self, thine intellectual son,
And the scarr'd hand of gallant Xenophon
Have gather'd up the fragments that remain
Of thy large speech, with wondrous wisdom fraught, From those rich morsels we may guess the feast, And note the Pisgah-summit of thy thought Bright with true trust, that God hath never ceased To care for all creative love hath wrought.
Another god-like son, O glorious land,
Athens, glad mother of a mighty line, In foremost rank of thine immortal band,
Wise, great, and good, unchallenged takes his stand, Plato the master, Plato the divine:
For that, unveil'd before his favour'd eyes,
Truth's everlasting dawn serenely rose
Glimmering from the windows of the skies,
And gold-bedropping, like the sun on streams,
The river of his rich poetic prose;
Yet clouded much by fancy's misty dreams,
That eloquence an Alpine torrent flows,
And thy strong mind, dim with ideal schemes,
Stands a stone mountain crown'd with melting snows.
Strange, that within the wondrous walls of space,
Ringing on some rare atmosphere far hence,
The periods of thy matchless eloquence
Are flying still in vibratory race,-
O prince of words and thoughts, Demosthenes:
Thee, centuries agone, great Athens bore
Chief orator above those brilliant four,
Démades, Lycurgus, Lysias, Eschines;
For thy majestic energy was still
Foremost in might to move, and power to please,
While midnight toil matured thy graceful ease,
And country's love inspired each Siren sound,
Now soft and gentle, as a trickling rill,
Now like a rushing torrent pour'd around.
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