 | Three Hundred Sonnets |  |
134
ISAAC NEWTON.
When craft and ignorance with envious tongueAt that lone Florentine their malice hurl'd,
On thee his robe the parting prophet flung,
And hail'd thy dawn to glorify the world,
Like the young moon the clouds of night among,
Modest and solitary, shedding forth
O'er the broad universe truth's holy light:
Yet ev'n against the meekness of thy worth
Detraction's withering breath, and jealous spite
Shed, not all impotent, their cankering blight;
For care sat with thee at thy silent hearth,
O gentle child of wisdom, whose keen eye
Dissolved the sunbeam, pierced the depths of earth,
And read the unwritten charters of the sky.
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