Oh, thou hadst been a wife for Shakspeare's self! No head, save some world-genius, ought to rest Above the treasures of that perfect breast, Or nightly draw fresh light from those keen stars Through which thy soul awes ours: yet thou art bound -- O waste of nature! -- to a craven hound; To shameless lust, and childish greed of pelf; Athene to a Satyr: was that link Forged by The Father's hand? Man's reason bars The bans which God allowed. -- Ay, so we think: Forgetting, thou hadst weaker been, full blest, Than thus made strong by suffering; and more great In martyrdom, than throned as Caesar's mate. Eversley, 1851. |