Phidias! supreme in thought! what hand but thine, In human works thus blending earth and heaven, O’er nature’s truth had spread that grace divine, To mortal form immortal grandeur given? What soul but thine, infusing all its power In these last monuments of matchless days, Could from their ruins bid young Genius tower, And Hope aspire to more exalted praise; And guide deep Thought to that secluded height Where excellence is throned in purity of light? XCIX. And who can tell how pure, how bright a flame, Caught from these models, may illume the west? What British Angelo may rise to fame,[54] On the free isle what beams of art may rest? Deem not, O England! that by climes confined, Genius and taste diffuse a partial ray;[55] Deem not the eternal energies of mind Sway’d by that sun whose doom is but decay! Shall thought be foster’d but by skies serene? No! thou hast power to be what Athens e’er hath been. C. But thine are treasures oft unprized, unknown, And cold neglect hath blighted many a mind, O’er whose young ardours had thy smile but shone, Their soaring flight had left a world behind! And many a gifted hand, that might have wrought To Grecian excellence the breathing stone, Or each pure grace of Raphael’s pencil caught, Leaving no record of its power, is gone! While thou hast fondly sought, on distant coast, Gems far less rich than those, thus precious, and thus lost CI. Yet rise, O Land, in all but art alone! Bid the sole wreath that is not thine be won! Fame dwells around thee--Genius is thine own; Call his rich blooms to life--be thou their sun! So, should dark ages o’er thy glory sweep, Should thine e’er be as now are Grecian plains, Nations unborn shall track thine own blue deep To hail thy shore, to worship thy remains; Thy mighty monuments with reverence trace, And cry, “This ancient soil hath nursed a glorious race!” [12] “The Pæstan rose, from its peculiar fragrance and the singularity of blooming twice a-year, is often mentioned by the classic poets. The wild rose, which now shoots up among the ruins, is of the small single damask kind, with a very high perfume; as a farmer assured me on the spot, it flowers both in spring and autumn.”--Swinburne’s _Travels in the Two Sicilies_. [13] In the naval engagements of the Greeks, “it was usual for the soldiers before the fight to sing a pæan, or hymn, to Mars, and after the fight another to Apollo.”--See Potter’s _Antiquities of Greece_, vol. ii. p. 155.