Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, ed. Poems of Places: An Anthology in 31 Volumes.
Spain, Portugal, Belgium, and Holland: Vols. XIV–XV. 1876–79. | | | | Portugal: Cintra | | Inscription for the Cell of Honorius, at the Cork Convent, near Cintra | | Robert Southey (1774–1843) |
| | | HERE, caverned like a beast, Honorius passed, | |
| In self-affliction, solitude, and prayer, | |
| Long years of penance. He had rooted out | |
| All human feelings from his heart, and fled | |
| With fear and loathing from all human joys. | 5 |
| Not thus in making known his will divine | |
| Hath Christ enjoined. To aid the fatherless, | |
| Comfort the sick, and be the poor man’s friend, | |
| And in the wounded heart pour gospel-balm,— | |
| These are the injunctions of his holy law, | 10 |
| Which whoso keeps shall have a joy on earth, | |
| Calm, constant, still increasing, preluding | |
| The eternal bliss of heaven. Yet mock not thou, | |
| Stranger, the anchorite’s mistaken zeal! | |
| He painfully his painful duties kept, | 15 |
| Sincere, though erring. Stranger! do thou keep | |
| Thy better and thine easier rule as well. | | | | |
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