Macmillan's Reading Books. Book V

John Stuart Mill · en
The Temple shakes, the sounding gates unfold,
    Wide vaults appear, and roofs of fretted gold,
    Raised on a thousand pillars wreathed around
    With laurel-foliage and with eagles crowned;
    Of bright transparent beryl were the walls,
    The friezes gold, and gold the capitals:
    As heaven with stars, the roof with jewels glows,
    And ever-living lamps depend in rows.
    Full in the passage of each spacious gate
    The sage historians in white garments wait:
    Graved o'er their seats, the form of Time was found,
    His scythe reversed, and both his pinions bound.
    Within stood heroes, who through loud alarms
    In bloody fields pursued renown in arms.
    High on a throne, with trophies charged, I viewed
    The youth that all things but himself subdued;
    His feet on sceptres and tiaras trode,
    And his horned head belied the Libyan god.
    There Caesar, graced with both Minervas, shone;
    Caesar, the world's great master, and his own;
    Unmoved, superior still in every state,
    And scarce detested in his country's fate.
    But chief were those, who not for empire fought,
    But with their toils their people's safety bought:
    High o'er the rest Epaminondas stood:
    Timoleon, glorious in his brother's blood:
    Bold Scipio, saviour of the Roman state,
    Great in his triumphs, in retirement great;
    And wise Aurelius, in whose well-taught mind
    With boundless power unbounded virtue joined,
    His own strict judge, and patron of mankind.
        Much-suffering heroes next their honours claim,
    Those of less noisy and less guilty fame,
    Fair Virtue's silent train: supreme of these
    Here ever shines the godlike Socrates;
    He whom ungrateful Athens could expel,
    At all times just but when he signed the shell:
    Here his abode the martyred Phocion claims,
    With Agis, not the last of Spartan names:
    Unconquered Cato shows the wound he tore,
    And Brutus his ill Genius meets no more.
        But in the centre of the hallowed choir,
    Six pompous columns o'er the rest aspire;
    Around the shrine itself of Fame they stand,
    Hold the chief honours, and the Fane command.
    High on the first the mighty Homer shone;
    Eternal adamant composed his throne;
    Father of verse! in holy fillets drest,
    His silver beard waved gently o'er his breast:
    Though blind, a boldness in his looks appears;
    In years he seemed, but not impaired by years.
    The wars of Troy were round the pillar seen:
    Here fierce Tydides wounds the Cyprian Queen;
    Here Hector glorious from Patroclus' fall,
    Here dragged in triumph round the Trojan wall.
    Motion and life did every part inspire,
    Bold was the work, and proved the master's fire.
    A strong expression most he seemed t' affect,
    And here and there disclosed a brave neglect.
        A golden column next in rank appeared,
    On which a shrine of purest gold was reared;