The voice of Minos shook the ground,
The startled ghosts on either side,
Like clouds before the wind, divide;
And leaving far a passage free,
Each, conning his defensive plea,
With many a crafty lure for grace.
The Painters onward hold their pace.
Anon before the Judgement Seat,
With sneer confronting sneer they meet:
And now in deep and awful strain,
Piercing like fiery darts the brain,
Thus Minos spake. Though I am he,
From whom no secret thought may flee;
Who sees it ere the birth be known
To him, that claims it for his own;
Yet would I still with patience hear
What each may for himself declare,
That all in your defence may see
The justice pure of my decree.--
But, hold!--It ill beseems my place
To hear debate in such a case:
Be therefore thou, Da Vinci's shade,
Who when on earth to men display'd
The scattered powers of human kind
In thy capacious soul combin'd;
Be thou the umpire of the strife,
And judge as thou wert still in life.

Thus bid, with grave becoming air,
Th' appointed judge assum'd the chair.