(The 110th anniversary of the completion of the "Decline and Fall" at the same hour and place) <br /> <br /> A spirit seems to pass, <br /> Formal in pose, but grave and grand withal: <br /> He contemplates a volume stout and tall, <br />And far lamps fleck him through the thin acacias. <br /> <br /> Anon the book is closed, <br /> With "It is finished!" And at the alley's end <br /> He turns, and soon on me his glances bend; <br />And, as from earth, comes speech--small, muted, yet composed. <br /> <br /> "How fares the Truth now?--Ill? <br /> --Do pens but slily further her advance? <br /> May one not speed her but in phrase askance? <br />Do scribes aver the Comic to be Reverend still? <br /> <br /> "Still rule those minds on earth <br /> At whom sage Milton's wormwood words were hurled: <br /> 'Truth like a bastard comes into the world <br />Never without ill-fame to him who gives her birth'?"<br /><br />Thomas Hardy<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/lausanne-in-gibbon-s-old-garden-11-12-p-m/
