O matchless book! Who can its worth describe?
What learned reader, or what ready scribe?
Within its pages finds the man of sense
The highest attributes of excellence:
A storehouse with a wealth of wisdom, see!
Of information one vast treasury.
Impressive in its simple speech, withal
Affording entertainment rich to all.
No book so popular throughout this sphere;
Read in the palace, where the great revere
Its truths; read in the cottage, where the poor
Feed on its precious promises so sure;
Read by the aged, when the tearful eye
Will often to its solace testify;
Read even with real pleasure by the young.
Received with uniform delight among
All nations under heaven, it equally
Suits all conditions of humanity.
The only book the int’rest can engage
Of either bond or free, or savage, sage;
So true to nature in its every part,
Holding the mirror to the human heart.
The sun doth not, ‘mong orbs that glow and wane,
More easily his master rank retain
Than doth this Book, with glory all supreme,
Amid the brilliant books of man’s esteem.