BEHOLD this ruin! ’T was a skull | |
| Once of ethereal spirit full. | |
| This narrow cell was Life’s retreat; | |
| This space was Thought’s mysterious seat. | |
| What beauteous visions filled this spot! | 5 |
| What dreams of pleasure long forgot! | |
| Nor hope, nor joy, nor love, nor fear | |
| Has left one trace of record here. | |
| |
| Beneath this moldering canopy | |
| Once shone the bright and busy eye: | 10 |
| But start not at the dismal void,— | |
| If social love that eye employed, | |
| If with no lawless fire it gleamed, | |
| But through the dews of kindness beamed, | |
| That eye shall be forever bright | 15 |
| When stars and sun are sunk in night. | |
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| Within this hollow cavern hung | |
| The ready, swift, and tuneful tongue: | |
| If Falsehood’s honey it disdained, | |
| And when it could not praise was chained; | 20 |
| If bold in Virtue’s cause it spoke, | |
| Yet gentle concord never broke,— | |
| This silent tongue shall plead for thee | |
| When Time unveils Eternity! | |
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| Say, did these fingers delve the mine, | 25 |
| Or with the envied rubies shine? | |
| To hew the rock, or wear a gem, | |
| Can little now avail to them; | |
| But if the page of Truth they sought, | |
| Or comfort to the mourner brought, | 30 |
| These hands a richer meed shall claim | |
| Than all that wait on Wealth and Fame. | |
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| Avails it whether bare or shod | |
| These feet the paths of duty trod? | |
| If from the bowers of Ease they fled, | 35 |
| To seek Affliction’s humble shed; | |
| If Grandeur’s guilty bribe they spurned, | |
| And home to Virtue’s cot returned,— | |
| These feet with angel wings shall vie, | |
| And tread the palace of the sky! | 40 |
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