William Stanley Braithwaite, ed. The Book of Georgian Verse. 1909. Inside of King’s College Chapel, Cambridge, I By William Wordsworth (1770–1850)
TAX not the royal Saint 1 with vain expense, With ill-matched aims the Architect who planned— Albeit labouring for a scanty band Of white robed Scholars only—this immense And glorious Work of fine intelligence! 5 Give all thou canst; high Heaven rejects the lore Of nicely-calculated less or more; So deemed the man who fashioned for the sense These lofty pillars, spread that branching roof Self-poised, and scooped into ten thousand cells, 10 Where light and shade repose, where music dwells Lingering—and wandering on as loth to die; Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof That they were born for immortality.
Note 1. Royal Saint: Henry VI., who founded King’s College in 1441, and who it is supposed laid the cornerstone of the chapel, generally considered a fine specimen of Gothic architecture. [back ]
