Weep not that the world changes--did it keep
A stable, changeless state, it were cause indeed to weep.
_Mutation_. W.C. BRYANT.
Manners with fortunes, humors turn with climes,
Tenets with books, and principles with times.
_Moral Essays, Epistle I. Pt. II_. A. POPE.
As hope and fear alternate chase
Our course through life's uncertain race.
_Rokeby, Canto VI_. SIR W. SCOTT.
This world is not for aye, nor 't is not strange
That even our loves should with our fortunes change.
_Hamlet, Act_ iii. _Sc_. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Man's wretched state,
That floures so fresh at morne, and fades at evening late.
_Faërie Queene, Bk. III. Canto IX_. E. SPENSER.
Imperious Cæsar, dead and turned to clay,
Might stop a hole to keep the wind away:
O, that that earth, which kept the world in awe,
Should patch a wall to expel the winter's flaw!
_Hamlet, Act v. Sc. 1_. SHAKESPEARE.
The seed ye sow, another reaps;
The wealth ye find, another keeps;
The robes ye weave, another wears;
The arms ye forge, another bears.
_To Men of England_. P.B. SHELLEY.
The flower that smiles to-day
To-morrow dies;
All that we wish to stay
Tempts and then flies:
What is this world's delight?
Lightning that mocks the night,
Brief even as bright.
_Mutability_. P.B. SHELLEY.
Sometimes an hour of Fate's serenest weather
Strikes through our changeful sky its coming beams;
Somewhere above us, in elusive ether,
Waits the fulfilment of our dearest dreams.
_Ad Amicos_. B. TAYLOR.