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| WHEN from the sacred garden driven, | |
| Man fled before his Maker’s wrath, | |
| An angel left her place in heaven, | |
| And cross’d the wanderer’s sunless path. | |
| ’T was Art! sweet Art! new radiance broke, | 5 |
| Where her light foot flew o’er the ground; | |
| And thus with seraph voice she spoke, | |
| “The curse a blessing shall be found.” | |
| |
| She led him through the trackless wild, | |
| Where noontide sunbeam never blazed:— | 10 |
| The thistle shrunk—the harvest smiled, | |
| And nature gladden’d as she gazed. | |
| Earth’s thousand tribes of living things, | |
| At Art’s command to him are given, | |
| The village grows, the city springs, | 15 |
| And point their spires of faith to heaven. | |
| |
| He rends the oak—and bids it ride, | |
| To guard the shores its beauty graced; | |
| He smites the rock—upheaved in pride, | |
| See towers of strength, and domes of taste. | 20 |
| Earth’s teeming caves their wealth reveal, | |
| Fire bears his banner on the wave, | |
| He bids the mortal poison heal, | |
| And leaps triumphant o’er the grave. | |
| |
| He plucks the pearls that stud the deep, | 25 |
| Admiring Beauty’s lap to fill: | |
| He breaks the stubborn marble’s sleep, | |
| And mocks his own Creator’s skill. | |
| With thoughts that swell his glowing soul, | |
| He bids the ore illume the page, | 30 |
| And proudly scorning time’s control, | |
| Commerces with an unborn age. | |
| |
| In fields of air he writes his name, | |
| And treads the chambers of the sky; | |
| He reads the stars, and grasps the flame, | 35 |
| That quivers round the Throne on high. | |
| In war renown’d, in peace sublime, | |
| He moves in greatness and in grace; | |
| His power subduing space and time, | |
| Links realm to realm, and race to race. | 40 |
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