Like as the damask rose you see,
Or like the blossom on the tree,
Or like the dainty flower in May,
Or like the morning of the day,
Or like the sun, or like the shade,
Or like the gourd which Jonas had,--
E'en such is man; whose thread is spun,
Drawn out, and cut, and so is done.--
The rose withers, the blossom blasteth,
The flower fades, the morning hasteth,
The sun sets, the shadow flies,
The gourd consumes,--and man he dies!
Like to the grass that's newly sprung,
Or like a tale that's new begun,
Or like the bird that's here to-day,
Or like the pearled dew of May,
Or like an hour, or like a span,
Or like the singing of a swan,--
E'en such is man; who lives by breath,
Is here, now there, in life and death.--
The grass withers, the tale is ended,
The bird is flown, the dew's ascended.
The hour is short, the span is long,
The swan's near death,--man's life is done!
SIMON WASTELL.
MORTALITY.
O why should the spirit of mortal be proud?
Like a fast-flitting meteor, a fast-flying cloud,
A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave,
He passes from life to his rest in the grave.
The leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade,
Be scattered around and together be laid;
And the young and the old, and the low and the high,
Shall moulder to dust and together shall lie.
The child that a mother attended and loved,
The mother that infant's affection that proved,
The husband that mother and infant that blessed,
Each, all, are away to their dwelling of rest.
The maid on whose cheek on whose brow, in whose eye,
Shone beauty and pleasure,--her triumphs are by;
And the memory of those that beloved her and praised
Are alike from the minds of the living erased.
The hand of the king that the sceptre hath borne,
The brow of the priest that the mitre hath worn,
The eye of the sage, and the heart of the brave,
Are hidden and lost in the depths of the grave.
The peasant whose lot was to sow and to reap,
The herdsman who climbed with his goats to the steep,
The beggar that wandered in search of his bread,
Have faded away like the grass that we tread.
The saint that enjoyed the communion of heaven,
The sinner that dared to remain unforgiven,
The wise and the foolish, the guilty and just,
Have quietly mingled their bones in the dust.
So the multitude goes, like the flower and the weed
That wither away to let others succeed;
So the multitude comes, even those we behold,
To repeat every tale that hath often been told.
For we are the same that our fathers have been;
We see the same sights that our fathers have seen,--
We drink the same stream, and we feel the same sun,
And we run the same course that our fathers have run.
The thoughts we are thinking, our fathers would think;
From the death we are shrinking from, they too would shrink;
To the life we are clinging to, they too would cling;
But it speeds from the earth like a bird on the wing.
They loved, but their story we cannot unfold;
They scorned, but the heart of the haughty is cold;
They grieved, but no wail from their slumbers may come;
They joyed, but the voice of their gladness is dumb.
They died, ay! they died! and we things that are now,
Who walk on the turf that lies over their brow,
Who make in their dwellings a transient abode,
Meet the changes they met on their pilgrimage road.
Yea! hope and despondence, and pleasure and pain,
Are mingled together like sunshine and rain;
And the smile and the tear, and the song and the dirge,
Still follow each other, like surge upon surge.
'Tis the wink of an eye, 't is the draught of a breath,
From the blossom of health to the paleness of death,
From the gilded saloon to the bier and the shroud;--
why should the spirit of mortal be proud?
WILLIAM KNOX.
THE HOUR OF DEATH.
Leaves have their time to fall,
And flowers to wither at the north-wind's breath,
And stars to set--but all,
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, oh! Death.
Day is for mortal care,
Eve for glad meetings round the joyous hearth,
Night for the dreams of sleep, the voice of prayer--
But all for thee, thou mightiest of the earth.
The banquet hath its hour,
Its feverish hour of mirth, and song, and wine;
There comes a day of griefs overwhelming power,
A time for softer tears--but all are thine.
Youth and the opening rose
May look like things too glorious for decay,
And smile at thee--but thou art not of those
That wait the ripened bloom to seize their prey.
Leaves have their time to fall,
And flowers to wither at the north-wind's breath,
And stars to set--but all,
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, oh! Death.
We know when moons shall wane,
When summer-birds from far shall cross the sea,
When autumn's hue shall tinge the golden grain--
But who shall teach us when to look for thee?
Is it when Spring's first gale
Comes forth to whisper where the violets lie?
Is it when roses in our paths grow pale?
They have _one_ season--_all_ are ours to die!
Thou art where billows foam,
Thou art where music melts upon the air;
Thou art around us in our peaceful home,
And the world calls us forth--and thou art there.
Thou art where friend meets friend,
Beneath the shadow of the elm to rest--
Thou art where foe meets foe, and trumpets rend
The skies, and swords beat down the princely crest.
Leaves have their time to fall,
And flowers to wither at the north-wind's breath,
And stars to set--but all.
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, oh! Death.
FELICIA DOROTHEA HEMANS.
THE TERM OF DEATH.
Between the falling leaf and rose-bud's breath;
The bird's forsaken nest and her new song
(And this is all the time there is for Death);
The worm and butterfly--it is not long!
SARAH MORGAN BRYAN PIATT.
A PICTURE OF DEATH.
FROM "THE GIAOUR."
He who hath bent him o'er the dead
Ere the first day of death is fled,
The first dark day of nothingness,
The last of danger and distress,
(Before Decay's effacing fingers
Have swept the lines where beauty lingers,)
And marked the mild angelic air,
The rapture of repose, that's there,
The fixed yet tender traits that streak
The languor of the placid cheek,
And--but for that sad shrouded eye,
That fires not, wins not, weeps not now,
And but for that chill, changeless brow,
Where cold Obstruction's apathy
Apalls the gazing mourner's heart,
As if to him it could impart
The doom he dreads, yet dwells upon;
Yes, but for these and these alone,
Some moments, ay, one treacherous hour,
He still might doubt the tyrant's power;
So fair, so calm, so softly sealed,
The first, last look by death revealed!
Such is the aspect of this shore;
'Tis Greece, but living Greece no more!
So coldly sweet, so deadly fair,
We start, for soul is wanting there.
Hers is the loveliness in death,
That parts not quite with parting breath;
But beauty with that fearful bloom,
That hue which haunts it to the tomb,
Expression's last receding ray,
A gilded halo hovering round decay,
The farewell beam of Feeling past away;
Spark of that flame, perchance of heavenly birth,
Which gleams, but warms no more its cherished earth!
LORD BYRON.
THE TWO MYSTERIES.
["In the middle of the room, in its white coffin, lay the dead child,
the nephew of the poet. Near it, in a great chair, sat Walt Whitman,
surrounded by little ones, and holding a beautiful little girl on his
lap. She looked wonderingly at the spectacle of death, and then
inquiringly into the old man's face. 'You don't know what it is, do you,
my dear?' said he, and added, 'We don't, either.'"]
We know not what it is, dear, this sleep so deep and still;
The folded hands, the awful calm, the cheek so pale and chill;
The lids that will not lift again, though we may call and call;
The strange white solitude of peace that settles over all.
We know not what it means, dear, this desolate heart-pain;
This dread to take our daily way, and walk in it again;
We know not to what other sphere the loved who leave us go,
Nor why we 're left to wonder still, nor why we do not know.
But this we know: Our loved and dead, if they should come this day--
Should come and ask us, "What is life?" not one of us could say.
Life is a mystery, as deep as ever death can be;
Yet, O, how dear it is to us, this life we live and see!
Then might they say--these vanished ones--and blessed is the thought,
"So death is sweet to us, beloved! though we may show you nought;
We may not to the quick reveal the mystery of death--
Ye cannot tell us, if ye would, the mystery of breath."
The child who enters life comes not with knowledge or intent,
So those who enter death must go as little children sent.
Nothing is known. But I believe that God is overhead;
And as life is to the living, so death is to the dead.
MARY MAPLES DODGE.
THANATOPSIS.
To him who, in the love of Nature, holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language: for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty; and she glides
Into his darker musings with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart,
Go forth under the open sky, and list
To Nature's teachings, while from all around--
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air--
Comes a still voice:--Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,
Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist
Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim
Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again;
And, lost each human trace, surrendering up
Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix forever with the elements;
To be a brother to the insensible rock,
And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mold.
Yet not to thine eternal resting-place
Shalt thou retire alone,--nor couldst thou wish
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world,--with kings,
The powerful of the earth,--the wise, the good,
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,
All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills,
Rock-ribbed, and ancient as the sun; the vales
Stretching in pensive quietness between;
The venerable woods; rivers that move
In majesty, and the complaining brooks,
That make the meadows green; and, poured round all,
Old ocean's gray and melancholy waste,--
Are but the solemn decorations all
Of the great tomb of man! The golden sun,
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,
Are shining on the sad abodes of death,
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
The globe are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom. Take the wings
Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness,
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound
Save his own dashings,--yet the dead are there!
And millions in those solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep,--the dead reign there alone!
So shalt thou rest; and what if thou withdraw
In silence from the living, and no friend
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care
Plod on, and each one, as before, will chase
His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men--
The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron and maid,
And the sweet babe, and the gray-headed man--
Shall, one by one, be gathered to thy side
By those who in their turn shall follow them.
So live, that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan that moves
To the pale realms of shade, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,
Scourged to his dungeon, but sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
Like one who wraps the drappery of his conch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.
WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT.
A MORNING THOUGHT.
What if some morning, when the stars were paling,
And the dawn whitened, and the east was clear,
Strange peace and rest fell on me from the presence
Of a benignant spirit standing near;
And I should tell him, as he stood beside me:--
"This is our earth--most friendly earth, and fair;
Daily its sea and shore through sun and shadow
Faithful it turns, robed in its azure air;
"There is blest living here, loving and serving,
And quest of truth, and serene friendships dear:
But stay not, Spirit! Earth has one destroyer--
His name is Death: flee, lest he find thee here!"
And what if then, while the still morning brightened,
And freshened in the elm the summer's breath,
Should gravely smile on me the gentle angel,
And take my hand and say, "My name is Death"?
EDWARD ROWLAND SILL.
NOW AND AFTERWARDS.
"Two hands upon the breast, and labor is past."
--RUSSIAN PROVERB.
"Two hands upon the breast,
And labor's done;
Two pale feet crossed in rest,--
The race is won;
Two eyes with coin-weights shut,
And all tears cease;
Two lips where grief is mute,
Anger at peace:"
So pray we oftentimes, mourning our lot;
God in his kindness answereth not.
"Two hands to work addrest
Aye for his praise;
Two feet that never rest
Walking his ways;
Two eyes that look above
Through all their tears;
Two lips still breathing love,
Not wrath, nor fears:"
So pray we afterwards, low on our knees;
Pardon those erring prayers! Father, hear these!
DINAH MARIA MULOCK CRAIK
THE GRAVE OF SOPHOCLES.
Tenderly, ivy, on Sophocles' grave--right tenderly--twine
Garlanding over the mound network of delicate green.
Everywhere flourish the flower of the rose, and the clustering vine
Pour out its branches around, wet with their glistering sheen.
All for the sake of the wisdom and grace it was his to combine;
Priest of the gay and profound, sweetest of singers terrene.
From the Greek of SIMMIAS.
Translation of WILLIAM M. HAUDINGE.
INSCRIPTION ON MELROSE ABBEY.
The earth goes on the earth glittering in gold,
The earth goes to the earth sooner than it wold;
The earth builds on the earth castles and towers,
The earth says to the earth--All this is ours.
ON THE TOMBS IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY.
Mortality, behold and fear
What a change of flesh is here!
Think how many royal bones
Sleep within these heaps of stones;
Here they lie, had realms and lands,
Who now want strength to stir their hands,
Where from their pulpits sealed with dust
They preach, "In greatness is no trust."
Here's an acre sown indeed
With the richest royallest seed
That the earth did e'er suck in
Since the first man died for sin:
Here the bones of birth have cried
"Though gods they were, as men they died!"
Here are sands, ignoble things,
Dropt from the ruined sides of kings:
Here's a world of pomp and state
Buried in dust, once dead by fate.
FRANCIS BEAUMONT.
ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY CHURCHYARD.
The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea,
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.
Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight.
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds:
Save that, from yonder ivy-mantled tower,
The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of such as, wandering near her secret bower,
Molest her ancient solitary reign.
[Hark! how the holy calm that breathes around
Bids every fierce tumultuous passion cease;
In still small accents whispering from the ground
The grateful earnest of eternal peace.][8]
Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade.
Where heaves the turf in many a moldering heap,
Each in his narrow cell forever laid,
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.
The breezy call of incense-breathing morn,
The swallow twittering from the straw-built shed,
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.
For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening care;
No children run to lisp their sire's return,
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.
Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,
Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke;
How jocund did they drive their team afield!
How bowed the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!
Let not ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
The short and simple annals of the poor.
The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Awaits alike the inevitable hour.
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.
Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault,
If Memory o'er their tomb no trophies raise,
Where, through the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault,
The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.
Can storied urn or animated bust:
Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?
Can honor's voice provoke the silent dust,
Or flattery soothe the dull, cold ear of death?
Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid;
Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire;
Hands, that the rod of empire might have swayed,
Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre;
But knowledge to their eyes her ample page,
Rich with the spoils of time, did ne'er unroll;
Chill penury repressed their noble rage,
And froze the genial current of the soul.
Full many a gem of purest ray serene;
The dark, unfathomed caves of ocean bear;
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.
Some village Hampden, that, with dauntless breast,
The little tryant of his fields withstood,
Some mute, inglorious Milton here may rest,
Some Cromwell, guiltless of his country's blood.
Th' applause of listening senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,
And read their history in a nation's eyes,
Their lot forbade: nor circumscribed alone
Their growing virtues, but their crimes confined;
Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne,
And shut the gates of mercy on mankind,
The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,
To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,
Or heap the shrine of luxury and pride
With incense kindled at the muse's flame.
Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife,
Their sober wishes never learned to stray;
Along the cool sequestered vale of life
They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.
Yet even these bones from insult to protect,
Some frail memorial still erected nigh,
With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture decked,
Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.
Their name, their years, spelt by th' unlettered muse,
The place of fame and elegy supply;
And many a holy text around she strews,
That teach the rustic moralist to die.
For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey,
This pleasing anxious being e'er resigned,
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
Nor cast one longing lingering look behind?
On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
Some pious drops the closing eye requires;
E'en from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,
E'en in our ashes live their wonted fires.
For thee, who, mindful of th' unhonored dead,
Dost in these lines their artless tale relate,
If chance, by lonely contemplation led,
Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate,
Haply some hoary-headed swain may say,
"Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn
Brushing with hasty steps the dews away,
To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.
"There at the foot of yonder nodding beech,
That wreathes its old, fantastic roots so high,
His listless length at noontide would he stretch,
And pore upon the brook that babbles by.
"Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn,
Muttering his wayward fancies he would rove;
Now drooping, woful-wan, like one forlorn.
Or crazed with care, or crossed in hopeless love.
"One morn I missed him on the customed hill,
Along the heath, and near his favorite tree;
Another came; nor yet beside the rill,
Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he;
"The next, with dirges due in sad array,
Slow through the church-way path we saw him borne.
Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay
Graved on the stone beneath yon aged thorn."
THE EPITAPH.
Here rests his head upon the lap of Earth
A youth to Fortune and to Fame unknown;
Fair Science frowned not on his humble birth,
And Melancholy marked him for her own.
Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere,
Heaven did a recompense as largely send;
He gave to Misery all he had, a tear,
He gained from Heaven ('t was all he wished) a friend.
No farther seek his merits to disclose,
Or draw his frailties from their dread abode,
(There they alike in trembling hope repose)
The bosom of his Father and his God.
THOMAS GRAY.
[8] Removed by the author from the original poem.
GOD'S-ACRE.
I like that ancient Saxon phrase which calls
The burial-ground God's-Acre! It is just;
It consecrates each grave within its walls,
And breathes a benison o'er the sleeping dust.
God's Acre! Yes, that blessed name imparts
Comfort to those who in the grave have sown
The seed that they had garnered in their hearts,
Their bread of life, alas! no more their own.
Into its furrows shall we all be cast,
In the sure faith that we shall rise again
At the great harvest, when the archangel's blast
Shall winnow, like a fan, the chaff and grain.
Then shall the good stand in immortal bloom,
In the fair gardens of that second birth;
And each bright blossom mingle its perfume
With that of flowers which never bloomed on earth.
With thy rude ploughshare, Death, turn up the sod,
And spread the furrow for the seed we sow;
This is the field and Acre of our God,
This is the place where human harvests grow!
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW.
SLEEPY HOLLOW.
No abbey's gloom, nor dark cathedral-stoops,
No winding torches paint the midnight air;
Here the green pines delight, the aspen droops
Along the modest pathways, and those fair
Pale asters of the season spread their plumes
Around this field, fit garden for our tombs.
And shalt thou pause to hear some funeral bell
Slow stealing o'er thy heart in this calm place,
Not with a throb of pain, a feverish knell,
But in its kind and supplicating grace,
It says, Go, pilgrim, on thy march, be more
Friend to the friendless than thou wast before;
Learn from the loved one's rest serenity:
To-morrow that soft bell for thee shall sound,
And thou repose beneath the whispering tree,
One tribute more to this submissive ground;--
Prison thy soul from malice, bar out pride,
Nor these pale flowers nor this still field deride:
Rather to those ascents of being turn,
Where a ne'er-setting sun illumes the year
Eternal, and the incessant watch-fires burn
Of unspent holiness and goodness clear,--
Forget man's littleness, deserve the best,
God's mercy in thy thought and life confest.
WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING.
THE QUAKER GRAVEYARD.
Four straight brick walls, severely plain,
A quiet city square surround;
A level space of nameless graves,--
The Quakers' burial-ground.
In gown of gray, or coat of drab,
They trod the common ways of life,
With passions held in sternest leash,
And hearts that knew not strife.
To yon grim meeting-house they fared,
With thoughts as sober as their speech,
To voiceless prayer, to songless praise,
To hear the elders preach.
Through quiet lengths of days they came,
With scarce a change to this repose;
Of all life's loveliness they took
The thorn without the rose.
But in the porch and o'er the graves,
Glad rings the southward robin's glee,
And sparrows fill the autumn air
With merry mutiny;
While on the graves of drab and gray
The red and gold of autumn lie,
And wilful Nature decks the sod
In gentlest mockery.
SILAS WEIR MITCHELL.
GREENWOOD CEMETERY.
How calm they sleep beneath the shade
Who once were weary of the strife,
And bent, like us, beneath the load
Of human life!
The willow hangs with sheltering grace
And benediction o'er their sod,
And Nature, hushed, assures the soul
They rest in God.
O weary hearts, what rest is here,
From all that curses yonder town!
So deep the peace, I almost long
To lay me down.
For, oh, it will be blest to sleep,
Nor dream, nor move, that silent night,
Till wakened in immortal strength
And heavenly light!
CRAMMOND KENNEDY.
THE DEAD.