CATHEDRALS, ETC.

By William Wordsworth

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!