In the Reading Room of the British Museum
    PRAISED be the moon of books! that doth above
    A world of men, the fallen Past behold,
    And fill the spaces else so void and cold
    To make a very heaven again thereof;
    As when the sun is set behind a grove,
    And faintly unto nether ether rolled,
    All night his whiter image and his mould
    Grows beautiful with looking on her love.

    Thou therefore, moon of so divine a ray,
    Lend to our steps both fortitude and light!
    Feebly along a venerable way
    They climb the infinite, or perish quite;
    Nothing are days and deeds to such as they,
    While in this liberal house thy face is bright.

        Louise Imogen Guiney