XXXVII + 

Pardon, oh, pardon, that my soul should make + 

Of all that strong divineness which I know + 

For thine and thee, an image only so + 

Formed of the sand, and fit to shift and break. + 

It is that distant years which did not take + 

Thy sovereignty, recoiling with a blow, + 

Have forced my swimming brain to undergo + 

Their doubt and dread, and blindly to forsake + 

Thy purity of likeness and distort + 

Thy worthiest love to a worthless counterfeit: + 

As if a shipwrecked Pagan, safe in port, + 

His guardian sea-god to commemorate, + 

Should set a sculptured porpoise, gills a-snort + 

And vibrant tail, within the temple-gate. + 