TO GEORGE CRUIKSHANK

Artist, whose hand, with horror wing'd, hath torn

From the rank life of towns this leaf! and flung

The prodigy of full-blown crime among

Valleys and men to middle fortune born,

Not innocent, indeed, yet not forlorn —

Say, what shall calm us when such guests intrude

Like comets on the heavenly solitude?

Shall breathless glades, cheer'd by shy Dian's horn,

Cold-bubbling springs, or caves?— Not so! The soul

Breasts her own griefs; and, urged too fiercely, says:

“Why tremble? True, the nobleness of man

May be by man effaced; man can control

To pain, to death, the bent of his own days.

Know thou the worst! So much, not more, he can.”