A few short years, at most, will bound our span; ( “Wretched and few,” the Hebrew patriarch said ) Live while you may, be jovial while you can; Too soon our debt to Nature, must be paid.
When Nature fails, the man exists no more, And death is nothing but an empty name, Spleen's odious offspring, in some gloomy hour;— The coward's tyrant, and the bad man's dream.
You ask me, where those numerous hosts have fled That once existed on this changeful ball? If aught remains, when mortal man is dead, Where ere their birth they were, they now are all.
Seek not for Paradise!—‘ tis not for you Where, high in heaven, its sweetest blossoms blow; Nor even, where gliding to the Persian main, Your waves, Euphrates, through the garden flow,
What is this Death, ye thoughtless mourners, say? Death is no more than never-ceasing change: New forms arise, while other forms decay, Yet, all is life throughout creation's range.
The towering Alps, the haughty Appenine, The Andes, wrapt in everlasting snow, The Apalachian, and the Ararat, Sooner or later, must to ruin go.
Hills sink to plains, and man returns to dust; That dust supports a reptile or a flower; Each changeful atom, by some other nursed, Takes some new form, to perish in an hour.
When Nature bids thee from the world retire, With joy thy lodging leave, a sated guest, In sleep's blest state ( our Dullman's fond desire ) Existing always — always to be blest.
Like insects busy in a summer's day, We toil and squabble, to increase our pain: Night comes at last, and weary of the fray, To dust and silence all are sent again!
Beneath my hand what numerous crowds retire — By the cold turf for ages, now, oppressed! Millions have fallen — and millions must expire, Doomed by the impartial Power to endless rest.
In vain with stars He decked yon’ spangled skies, And bade the mind to heaven's bright regions soar, And brought so far to your admiring eyes A glimpse of glories, that shall blaze no more!
What is there here, that man should wish to bear A weight of years?— such rage to madness vext; Wan, wasting, grief, and ever musing care, Distressful pain, and poverty perplext?—
What is there here, but tombs and monuments — Tyrants — who misery spread through every shore; Wide wasting wars, the scourge of innocence; Fevers and plagues, with all their noxious store?
Before we called this wrangling world our home, In undisturbed abodes we sweetly slept: But when dame Nature made that world our doom, ‘ Twas then our troubles came — and then we wept!
Though humbled now, disheartened, or distressed, Yet, when returning to the peaceful ground, With heroes, kings, and conquerors we shall rest; Shall sleep as sweetly, and no doubt, as sound.
Ne'er shall we hope to see the day-light spring Or from the up-lifted window lean to hear ( Fore-runner of the scarlet-mantled morn ) The early note of wakeful Chanticleer!
Oblivion there, expands her raven wing:— We soon must go where all the dead are gone, Trace the dull path, explore the gloomy road To that dark country, where I see no dawn.
Then why these sobs, these useless floods of woe, That vainly flow for the departed dead? If doomed to wander on the coasts below, What are to them these floods of grief you shed?
Since heaven in rapture doth their hours employ — If empty sighs, or groans, could reach them there, These funeral howls would damp their heaven of joy, Would make them wretched, and renew their care.
The joys of wine, immortal as my theme, To days of mirth the aspiring soul invite: Life, void of this, a punishment I deem, A Greenland winter, robbed of heat and light.
Ah! envy not, ye sages too precise, The drop from life's gay tree, that kills our woe — Noah himself, the wary and the wise, A vineyard planted — and the vines did grow.
( Of social soul was he ) — the grape he pressed, And drank the juice, oblivious to his care: Sorrow he banished from his place of rest, And sighs, and sextons, had no business there.
Such bliss be our's through every changing scene: The jovial face bespeaks the glowing heart; If heaven be joy, wine is to heaven a-kin, Since wine, on earth, can heavenly joys impart.
Mere glow-worms are we all — a moment shine!— I, like the rest, in giddy circles run, And grief shall say, when I this breath resign, His glass is empty, and his sermon done!
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