If being near the fire I burned with it, Now that its flame is quenched and doth not show, What wonder if I waste within and glow, Dwindling away to cinders bit by bit? ...
When divine Art conceives a form and face, She bids the craftsman for his first essay To shape a simple model in mere clay: This is the earliest birth of Art's embrace....
Give back unto mine eyes, ye fount and rill, Those streams, not yours, that are so full and strong, That swell your springs, and roll your waves along...
When that which is divine in us doth try To shape a face, both brain and hand unite To give, from a mere model frail and slight, Life to the stone by Art's free energy....
New Ark of Noah! when the cruel scourge Of that barbarian tyrant like a wave Went over Italy, thou then didst save The seed of just men on the weltering surge....
Now hath my life across a stormy sea Like a frail bark reached that wide port where all Are bidden, ere the final reckoning fall Of good and evil for eternity. ...
Blest spirit, who with loving tenderness Quickenest my heart so old and near to die, Who mid thy joys on me dost bend an eye Though many nobler men around thee press!...