Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
England: Vols. I–IV. 1876–79. | | | | Stratford-on-Avon | | On Shakespeare, 1630 | | John Milton (1608–1674) |
| | | WHAT needs my Shakespeare for his honored bones | |
| The labor of an age in piléd stones, | |
| Or that his hallowed reliques should be hid | |
| Under a star-ypointing pyramid? | |
| Dear son of memory, great heir of fame, | 5 |
| What need’st thou such weak witness of thy name? | |
| Thou in our wonder and astonishment | |
| Hast built thyself a livelong monument. | |
| For whilst to the shame of slow endeavoring art | |
| Thy easy numbers flow, and that each heart | 10 |
| Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued book | |
| Those Delphic lines with deep impression took; | |
| Then thou our fancy of itself bereaving, | |
| Dost make us marble with too much conceiving; | |
| And so sepulchred, in such pomp dost lie, | 15 |
| That kings for such a tomb would wish to die. | | | | |
|
|
