Page:The poems of Emma Lazarus volume 1.djvu/168

154 Her loss, and view with other eyes his fate. Even as the cunning workman brings to pass The sculptor s thought from out the unwieldy mass Of shapeless marble, so Time lops away The stony crust of falsehood that concealed His just proportions, and, at last revealed, The statue issues to the light of day, Most beautiful, most human. Let them fling The first stone who are tempted even as he, And have not swerved. When did that rare soul sing The victim s shame, the tyrant s eulogy, The great belittle, or exalt the small, Or grudge his gift, his blood, to disenthrall The slaves of tyranny or ignorance? Stung by fierce tongues himself, whose rightful fame Hath he reviled ? Upon what noble name Did the winged arrows of that barbed wit glance? The years thick, clinging curtains backward pull, And show him as he is, crowned with bright beams, &quot; Beauteous, and yet not all as beautiful As he hath been or might be ; Sorrow seems Half of his immortality.&quot; He needs No monument whose name and song and deeds