Further to force their way, endowed its trunk 140 With magnitude and strength fit to uphold The glorious temple--did alike proceed From the same gracious will, were both an offspring Of bounty infinite. Between Powers that aim Higher to lift their lofty heads, impelled 145 By no profane ambition, Powers that thrive By conflict, and their opposites, that trust In lowliness--a mid-way tract there lies Of thoughtful sentiment for every mind Pregnant with good. Young, Middle-aged, and Old, 150 From century on to century, must have known The emotion--nay, more fitly were it said-- The blest tranquillity that sunk so deep Into my spirit, when I paced, enclosed In Pisa’s Campo Santo,[80] the smooth floor 155 Of its Arcades paved with sepulchral slabs,[81] And through each window’s open fret-work looked O’er the blank Area of sacred earth Fetched from Mount Calvary,[82] or haply delved In precincts nearer to the Saviour’s tomb, 160 By hands of men, humble as brave, who fought For its deliverance--a capacious field That to descendants of the dead it holds And to all living mute memento breathes, More touching far than aught which on the walls 165 Is pictured, or their epitaphs can speak, Of the changed City’s long-departed power, Glory, and wealth, which, perilous as they are, Here did not kill, but nourished, Piety. And, high above that length of cloistral roof, 170 Peering in air and backed by azure sky, To kindred contemplations ministers The Baptistery’s dome,[83] and that which swells From the Cathedral pile;[84] and with the twain Conjoined in prospect mutable or fixed 175 (As hurry on in eagerness the feet, Or pause) the summit of the Leaning-tower.[85] Nor[86] less remuneration waits on him Who having left the Cemetery stands In the Tower’s shadow, of decline and fall 180 Admonished not without some sense of fear, Fear that soon vanishes before the sight Of splendour unextinguished, pomp unscathed, And beauty unimpaired. Grand in itself, And for itself, the assemblage, grand and fair 185 To view, and for the mind’s consenting eye A type of age in man, upon its front Bearing the world-acknowledged evidence Of past exploits, nor fondly after more Struggling against the stream of destiny, 190 But with its peaceful majesty content. --Oh what a spectacle at every turn The Place unfolds, from pavement skinned with moss, Or grass-grown spaces, where the heaviest foot Provokes no echoes, but must softly tread; 195 Where Solitude with Silence paired stops short