H, why should the spirit of mortal be proud?
Like a swift-fleeting meteor, a fast-flying cloud,
A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave,
Man 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 infant a mother attended and loved,
The mother that infant's affection who proved;
The husband that mother and infant who blessed,
Each, all, are away to their dwellings 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 who loved her and praised,
e 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 depth of the grave.

The peasant, whose lot was to sow and to reap:
The herdsman, who climbed with his goats up the steep;
The beggar, who wandered in search of his bread,
Have faded away like the grass that we tread.

The saint who enjoyed the communion of heaven,
The sinner who 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 flowers or the weed
That withers away to let others succeed;

So the multitude comes, even those we behold,
To repeat every tale that has often been told.

For we are the same our fathers have been;
We see the same sights our fathers have seen,-
We drink the same stream and view the same sun,
And run the same course our fathers have run.

The thoughts we are thinking our fathers would think,
From the death we are shrinking our fathers would shrink,
To the life we are clinging they also would cling;
But it speeds for us all, like a bird on the wing.

They loved, but the story we cannot unfold:
They scorned, but the heart of the haughty is cold;
They grieved, but no wail from their slumbers will come;
They joyed, but the tongue of their gladness is dumb.
They died, aye! 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 things that they met on their pilgrimage road.

Yea! hope and despondency, pleasure and pain,
We mingle together in sunshine and rain;
And the smiles and the tears, the song and the dirge,
Still follow each other, like surge upon surge.

'Tis the wink of an eye, 'tis 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,-
Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud?

AKE me no vows of constancy, dear friend,
To love me, though I die, thy whole life long,
And love no other till thy days shall end,-
Nay, it were rash and wrong.

If thou canst love another, be it so;

I would not reach out of my quiet grave
To bind thy heart, if it should choose to go;-
Love should not be a slave.

My placid ghost, I trust, will walk serene
In clearer light than gilds these earthly morns,
Above the jealousies and envies keen,
Which sow this life with thorns.

Thou wouldst not feel my shadowy caress,

If, after death, my soul should linger here;
Men's hearts crave tangible, close tenderness,
Love's presence, warm and near.

It would not make me sleep more peacefully
That thou wert wasting all thy life in woe

For my poor sake; what love thou hast for me
Bestow it ere I go!

Carve not upon a stone when I am dead
The praises which remorseful mourners give
To women's graves-a tardy recompense-
But speak them while I live.

Heap not the heavy marble on my head

To shut away the sunshine and the dew; Let small blooms grow there, and let grasses ware, And rain drops filter through.

Thou wilt meet many fairer and more gay

Than I; but, trust me, thou canst never find One who will love and serve thee night and day With a more single mind.

Forget me when I die! The violets

Above my rest will blossom just as blue, Nor miss thy tears; e'en nature's self forgets; But while I live, be true!

OMETIME, when all life's lessons

have been learned,

And sun and stars for ever

more have set,

The things which our weak
judgments here have spurned,
The things o'er which we
grieved with lashes wet,
Will flash before us out of
life's dark night,

As stars shine most in deeper tints of blue;
And we shall see how all God's plans were right,

And how what seemed reproof was love most true.

And we shall see how, while we frown and sigh,
God's plans go on as best for you and me;
How, when we called, He heeded not our cry,
Because His wisdom to the end could see.
And e'en as prudent parents disallow

Too much of sweet to craving babyhood,
So God, perhaps, is keeping from us now
Life's sweetest things because it seemeth good.
And if, sometimes, commingled with life's wine,
We find the wormwood, and reoel and shrink,

Be sure a wiser hand than yours or mine Pours out this portion for our lips to drink. And if some friend we love is lying low, Where human kisses cannot reach his face, Oh, do not blame the loving Father so,

But wear your sorrow with obedient grace!

And you shall shortly know that lengthened breath
Is not the sweetest gift God sends His friend,
And that, sometimes, the sable pall of death
Conceals the fairest boon His love can send.
If we could push ajar the gates of life,

And stand within, and all God's workings see,
We could interpret all this doubt and strife,
And for each mystery could find a key!
But not to-day.

Then be content, poor heart! God's plans like lilies pure and white unfold; We must not tear the close-shut leaves apart, Time will reveal the calyxes of gold. And if, through patient toil, we reach the land Where tired feet, with sandals loose, may rest, When we shall clearly know and understand, I think that we will say, "God knew the best!"

E GO our ways in life too much alone;

We hold ourselves too far from all our kind;
Too often we are dead to sigh and moan;
Too often to the weak and helpless blind;
Too often, where distress and want abide,
We turn and pass upon the other side.

The
he other side is trodden smooth, and worn
By footsteps passing idly all the day.

Where lie the bruised ones that faint and mourn,
Is seldom more than an untrodden way;
Our selfish hearts are for our feet the guide,
They lead us by upon the other side.

It should be ours the oil and wine to pour
Into the bleeding wounds of stricken ones;
To take the smitten, and the sick and sore,

And bear them where a stream of blessing runs;
Instead, we look about-the way is wide,
And so we pass upon the other side.

Eh, friends and brothers, gliding down the years,
Humanity is calling each and all

In tender accents, born of grief and tears!
I pray you, listen to the thrilling call;
You cannot, in your cold and selfish pride,
Pass guiltlessly by on the other side.