OPEN your gates, ye everlasting Piles! Types of the spiritual Church which God hath reared; Not loth we quit the newly-hallowed sward And humble altar, 'mid your sumptuous aisles To kneel, or thrid your intricate defiles, Or down the nave to pace in motion slow; Watching, with upward eye, the tall tower grow And mount, at every step, with living wiles Instinct -- to rouse the heart and lead the will By a bright ladder to the world above. Open your gates, ye Monuments of love Divine! thou Lincoln, on thy sovereign hill! Thou, stately York! and Ye, whose splendours cheer Isis and Cam, to patient Science dear! | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...ON LIVING, FROM LIFE IS A DREAM by PEDRO CALDERON DE LA BARCA THE PINES AND THE SEA by CHRISTOPHER PEARSE CRANCH DIXIE by DANIEL DECATUR EMMETT BURY ME IN A FREE LAND by FRANCES ELLEN WATKINS HARPER SONNET TO ALISA ROCK by JOHN KEATS THE MOCKING BIRD by SIDNEY LANIER THE BALLAD OF DEAD LADIES by FRANCOIS VILLON THE DAY OF JUDGEMENT; AN ODE ATTEMPTED IN ENGLISH SAPPHIC by ISAAC WATTS |