Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE LIBRARY, by JOHN GODFREY SAXE


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE LIBRARY, by                     Poet's Biography
First Line: Here, e'en the sturdy democrat may find
Last Line: T is wise to learn; 't is godlike to create!
Subject(s): Books; Reading


HERE, e'en the sturdy democrat may find,
Nor scorn their rank, the nobles of the mind;
While kings may learn, nor blush at being shown,
How Learning's patents abrogate their own.
A goodly company and fair to see:
Royal plebeians; earls of low degree;
Beggars whose wealth enriches every clime;
Princes who scarce can boast a mental dime,
Crowd here together, like the quaint array
Of jostling neighbors on a market day:
Homer and Milton, -- can we call them blind? --
Of godlike sight, the vision of the mind;
Shakespeare, who calmly looked creation through,
"Exhausted worlds, and then imagined new;"
Plato the sage, so thoughtful and serene,
He seems a prophet by his heavenly mien;
Shrewd Socrates, whose philosophic power
Xantippe proved in many a trying hour;
And Aristophanes, whose humor run
In vain endeavor to be-"cloud" the sun;
Majestic AEschylus, whose glowing page
Holds half the grandeur of the Athenian stage;
Pindar, whose odes, replete with heavenly fire,
Proclaim the master of the Grecian lyre;
Anacreon, famed for many a luscious line
Devote to Venus and the god of wine.
I love vast libraries; yet there is a doubt
If one be better with them or without, --
Unless he use them wisely, and, indeed,
Knows the high art of what and how to read.
At Learning's fountain it is sweet to drink,
But 't is a nobler privilege to think;
And oft, from books apart, the thirsting mind
May make the nectar which it cannot find.
'T is well to borrow from the good and great;
'T is wise to learn; 't is godlike to create!





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