Oh, that beneath thy friendly ray,

On peaky summit I might stray,

Round mountain caves with spirits hover,

And flit the glimmering meadows over,

And from all fevered fumes of thinking free,

Bathe me to health within thy dewy sea.

In vain! still pines my prisoned soul

Within this curst dank dungeon-hole!

Where dimly finds ev’n heaven’s blest ray,

Through painted glass, its struggling way.

Shut in by heaps of books up-piled,

All worm-begnawed and dust-besoiled,

With yellowed papers, from the ground

To the smoked ceiling, stuck around;

Caged in with old ancestral lumber,

Cases, boxes, without number,

Broken glass, and crazy chair,

Dust and brittleness everywhere;

This is thy world, a world for a man’s soul to breathe in!

And ask I still why in my breast,

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