The fancy of an age gone by,
When Fancy's self to earth declined,
Still thirsting for Divinity,
Yet still, through sense, to Godhead blind,
Poor mimic of that Truth of old,
The patriarchs’ hope — a faith revealed —
Compressed its God in mortal mould,
The prisoner of Creation's field.
Nature and Nature's Lord were one!
Then countless gods from cloud and stream
Glanced forth; from sea, and moon, and sun:
So ran the pantheistic dream.
And thus the All-Holy, thus the All-True,
The One Supreme, the Good, the Just,
Like mist was scattered, lost like dew,
And vanished in the wayside dust.
Mary! through thee the idols fell:
When He the nations longed for came —
True God yet Man — with man to dwell,
The phantoms hid their heads for shame.
His place or thine removed, ere long
The bards would push the sects aside;
And lifted by the might of song
Olympus stand re-edified.