 | Three Hundred Sonnets |  |
146
JOHNSON.
Stern moralist, whose potent intellectFlooded the world with all the Nile of truth,
Slave to no master, prisoner of no sect,
Albeit disease, and want, and harsh neglect
Were long the bitter portion of thy youth,
Thine Atlas mind stood firm beneath the weight,
Preaching the noble homily to men
That poverty hath uses real and great,
In quickening thought, urging the sluggish pen,
Claiming due labours of the listless brow,
Forcing its flowers of wit, and fruits of sense,
And, for man's wonder, bidding grandly flow
The deluge of a Johnson's eloquence,
Like thundering Niagara, strong and slow.
| Three Hundred Sonnets | |