Note 39 — Chapter VIII

Should it e'er come to pass that the sacred poem to which both heaven and earth so have set hand, that it hath made me lean through many a year, should overcome the cruelty which doth bar me forth from the fair sheepfold wherein I used to sleep, a lamb, foe to the wolves which war upon it; with changed voice now, and with changed fleece shall I return, a poet, and at the font of my baptism shall I assume the chaplet; because into the Faith which maketh souls known of God, 'twas there I entered. –Par. xxv. 1-11, Wicksteed's translation.