On the Defeat of a Great Man

Fallen? how fallen? States and empires fall;     O’er towers and rock-built walls, And perished nations, floods to tempests call With hollow sound along the sea of time:     The great man never falls. He lives, he towers aloft, he stands sublime:     They fall who give him not The honor here that suits his future name,—     They die and are forgot. O Giant loud and blind! the great man’s fame   Is his own shadow, and not cast by thee,—     A shadow that shall grow As down the heaven of time the sun descends,     And on the world shall throw His god-like image, till it sinks where blends   Time’s dim horizon with Eternity.