Yet, all forgot, how oft the eye-lids close,

And from the slack hand drops the gathered rose!

How oft, as dead, on the warm turf we lie,

While many an emmet comes with curious eye;

And on her nest the watchful wren sits by!

Nor do we speak or move, or hear or see;

So like what once we were, and once again shall be!

And say, how soon, where, blithe as innocent,

The boy at sun-rise whistled as he went,

An aged pilgrim on his staff shall lean,

Tracing in vain the footsteps o'er the green;

The man himself how altered, not the scene!

Now journeying home with nothing but the name;

Way-worn and spent, another and the same!

No eye observes the growth or the decay.

To-day we look as we did yesterday;

Yet while the loveliest smiles, her locks grow grey!

And in her glass could she but see the face

She'll see so soon amidst another race,

How would she shrink!-Returning from afar,

After some years of travel, some of war,

Within his gate Ulysses stood unknown

Before a wife, a father, and a son!

And such is Human Life, the general theme.

Ah, what at best, what but a longer dream?

Though with such wild romantic wanderings fraught,

Such forms in Fancy's richest colouring wrought,

That, like the visions of a love-sick brain,

Who would not sleep and dream them o'er again?

Our pathway leads but to a precipice ;*

And all must follow, fearful as it is!

From the first step 'tis known; but-No delay!

On, 'tis decreed. We tremble and obey.

A thousand ills beset us as we go.

-“Still, could I shun the fatal gulf”-Ah, no,

"Tis all in vain—the inexorable Law!

Nearer and nearer to the brink we draw.

Verdure springs up; and fruits and flowers invite, And groves and fountains-all things that delight. "Oh I would stop, and linger if I might!"

We fly; no resting for the foot we find;

All dark before, all desolate behind!

At length the brink appears-but one step more!

We faint-On, on!-we falter-and 'tis o'er!

Yet here high passions, high desires unfold, Prompting to noblest deeds; here links of gold Bind soul to soul; and thoughts divine inspire

A thirst unquenchable, a holy fire

That will not, cannot but with life expire!

Now, seraph-winged, among the stars we soar;

Now distant ages, like a day, explore,

And judge the act, the actor now no more;

Or, in a thankless hour condemned to live,

From others claim what these refuse to give,

And dart, like Milton, an unerring eye

Through the dim curtains of Futurity."

Wealth, Pleasure, Ease, all thought of self resigned,

What will not Man encounter for Mankind?

Behold him now unbar the prison-door,

And, lifting Guilt, Contagion from the floor,

To Peace and Health, and Light and Life restore;

Now in Thermopylæ remain to share

Death-nor look back, nor turn a footstep there,

Leaving his story to the birds of air;