To Coleridge

Thou who hast amply quaff'd the Muse's rill, And bath'd thy locks in pure poetic dews, Canst thou disparage the Petrarcan Muse; To her sweet voice deaf, cold, fastidious still! Examine if unprejudic'd the will, Coleridge, which can to her high praise refuse; And of perverseness her fair laws accuse Which through the enchanted ear the bosom fill. Her various, cadenc'd, regularity He who o'er epic heights hath soar'd sublime, And magic Spenser, lov'd. The mighty dead Have followers, haply to posterity Not unendear'd.--O scorn not these, who led In many a graceful maze the full harmonious rhyme.