That thy great beauty on our earth may be Shrined in a lady softer and more kind, I call on nature to collect and bind All those delights the slow years steal from thee,...
I cannot by the utmost flight of thought Conceive another form of air or clay, Wherewith against thy beauty to array My wounded heart in armour fancy-wrought:...
You sect most adverse to the good and true, Degenerate from your origin divine, Pastured on lies and shadows by the line Of Thais, Sinon, Judas, Homer! You,...
If men were happy in that age of gold, We yet may hope to see mild Saturn's reign; For all things that were buried live again, By time's revolving cycle forward rolled....
The golden head was Babylon; she passed: Persia came next, the silvern breast: whereto Joined brazen flank and belly--these are you, Ye men of Macedon! Now Rome's the last....
Here bend in boundless wonder; bow your head: Think how God's deathless Mind, that men might be Robed in celestial immortality (O Love divine!), in flesh was raimented:...
O you who love the part more than the whole, And love yourself more than all human kind, Who persecute good men with prudence blind Because they combat your malign control,...
Valour and mind form real nobility, The which bears fruit and shows a fair increase By doughty actions: these and nought but these Confer true patents of gentility....