Home
Fictions/Novels
Short Stories
Poems
Essays
Plays
Nonfictions
 
Authors
All Titles
 






In Association with Amazon.com

Home > Authors Index > Browse all available works of Mark Akenside > Text of On Love Of Praise

A poem by Mark Akenside

On Love Of Praise

________________________________________________
Title:     On Love Of Praise
Author: Mark Akenside [More Titles by Akenside]

Of all the springs within the mind
Which prompt her steps in fortune's maze,
From none more pleasing aid we find
Than from the genuine love of praise.

Nor any partial, private end
Such reverence to the public bears;
Nor any passion, virtue's friend,
So like to virtue's self appears.

For who in glory can delight
Without delight in glorious deeds?
What man a charming voice can slight,
Who courts the echo that succeeds?

But not the echo on the voice
More than on virtue praise depends;
To which, of course, its real price
The judgment of the praiser lends.

If praise, then, with religious awe
From the sole perfect judge be sought,
A nobler aim, a purer law,
Nor priest, nor bard, nor sage hath taught.

With which in character the same,
Though in an humbler sphere it lies,
I count that soul of human fame,
The suffrage of the good and wise.


[The end]
Mark Akenside's poem: On Love Of Praise

________________________________________________



GO TO TOP OF SCREEN