the burden of the song was hope for all the nations of the earth.
Because every beautiful and wise thought that any man conceives
is the heritage of the whole race of men, and an earnest and
foregleam of what all men will some day inviolably hold for true.
And forasmuch as poets are the advanced guard of the marching army
of humanity, therefore they are necessarily the first discoverers
and proclaimers of the new landscapes and ranges of Duties and Rights
that rise out of the horizon, point after point, and vista after
vista, along the line of progress. For the sonnet of the poet today
is to furnish the keynote of the morrow's speech in Parliament,
as that which yesterday was song is today the current prose of the
hustings, the pulpit, and the market. Wherefore, O poet, take heart
for the world; thou, in whose utterance speaks the inevitable Future;
who art thyself God's prophecy and covenant of what the race at
large shall one day be! Sing thy songs, utter thine whole intent,
recount thy vision; though today no one heed thee, thou hast
nevertheless spoken, and the spoken word is not lost. Every true
thought lives, because the Spirit of God is in it, and when time
is ripe it will incarnate itself in action. Thou, thou art the
creator, the man of thought; thou art the pioneer of the ages!

Somewhat on this wise sang the fairy bird, and thereby the poet
was comforted, and took courage, and lifted up his voice and his
apocalypse. And though few people cared to hear, and many jeered,
and some rebuked, he minded only that all he should say might be
well said, and be as perfect and wise and worthy as he could make it.
And when he had finished his testimony, he went forth from the gates
of the town, and began once more to traverse the solitudes of moor
and forest.