On Genius.
Ye Sages, me tell what can learning impart,
If the rich ore of Genius lies not in the heart?
Why strive ye to burnish the crude gloomy mind,
When no gleams of the true innate gem ye can find?
Ah! Sires, I can tell you, she lies not in lore,
Nor dwells she where riches and affluence soar;
For the greatest of dunces return from your schools,
And the great, we oft find, are the veriest fools.
Oh hail! gift of Nature, which wealth cannot buy,
Descendant divine of the star-spangled sky;
Who, heedless, will pass by the gold-garnish'd wight,
On the drudge in oblivion's hid realms to alight.
She loathes e'en to surfeit the jargon of schools;
Her soul spurns to stoop to the foible of rules;
She sees, with one glance of her quick mental eye,
What the dolt, in a month's demonstration, can't spy.
Thee, Newton! I place next the race of the gods,
For the most thou didst know of their laws and abodes;
Who, from principles simple, didst draw all thy ken;
For ever thou'lt stand at the head of wise men.
O Milton! who taught thee to strike the sweet lyre?
From what coal of heaven didst thou catch the bright fire?
From Genius, imprimis, which learning refined,
And show'd to the world thy unlimited mind.
But, Shakespeare! where found'st thou thy bold-featured muse?
And whence didst thou bring thy bright costume profuse?
From nature, I ween—nowhere else could it be,
When the fates had consign'd thee to black poverty.
And where, matchless Crichton! in what happy shade,
Didst thou find out Genius, the heaven-born maid?
Thou found'st her unsought, thou exception 'mong mortals,
Who wast most ignobly consign'd to death's portals!
Great Burns! bright example of nature's donation,
The gift it was grand, although humble thy station;
Thy sweet loreless harp shall with ecstacy ring
When the cant lyres of pedants shall wear not a string.
Thou fruit tree spontaneous, O Genius—on which
No tame graft from learning thy fruit can enrich—
I love thee, admire thee, adore thee, divine,
And bow down and worship before thy rich shrine.
