Sleep, motley, with the great of ancient days,
Who wrote for all the years that yet shall be!
Sleep with Herodotus, whose name and praise
Have reached the isles of earth’s remotest sea;
Sleep, while, defiant of the slow decays
Of time, thy glorious writings speak for thee,
And in the answering heart of millions raise
The generous zeal for...
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A mighty Hand, from an exhaustless Urn,
Pours forth the never-ending Flood of Years,
Among the nations. How the rushing waves
Bear all before them! On their foremost edge,
And there alone, is Life. The Present there
Tosses and foams, and fills the air with roar
Of mingled noises. There are they who toil,
And they who strive, and they who... -
O, Fairest of the rural maids!
Thy birth was in the forest shades;
Green boughs, and glimpses of the sky,
Were all that met thine infant eye.Thy sports, thy wanderings, when a child,
Were ever in the sylvan wild,
And all the beauty of the place
Is in thy heart and on thy face.The twilight of the trees and rocks
Is in... -
TO him who, in the love of Nature, holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language: for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty; and she glides
Into his darker musings with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts
... -
Oh, deem not they are blest alone
Whose lives a peaceful tenor keep;
The Power who pities man, has shown
A blessing for the eyes that weep.The light of smiles shall fill again
The lids that overflow with tears;
And weary hours of woe and pain
Are promises of happier years.There is a day of sunny rest
For... -
Within this lowly grave a Conqueror lies,
And yet the monument proclaims it not,
Nor round the sleeper’s name hath chisel wrought
The emblems of a fame that never dies,
Ivy and amaranth in a graceful sheaf,
Twined with the laurel’s fair, imperial leaf.
A simple name alone,
To the great world unknown,
Is graven here... -
How shall I know thee in the sphere which keeps
The disembodied spirits of the dead,
When all of thee that time could wither sleeps
And perishes among the dust we tread?For I shall feel the sting of ceaseless pain
If there I meet thy gentle presence not;
Nor hear the voice I love, nor read again
In thy serenest eyes the tender... -
Spirit that breathest through my lattice: thou
That cool’st the twilight of the sultry day!
Gratefully flows thy freshness round my brow;
Thou hast been out upon the deep at play,
Riding all day the wild blue waves till now,
Roughening their crests, and scattering high their spray,
And swelling the white sail. I welcome thee
To the... -
I Gazed upon the glorious sky,
And the green mountains round,
And thought that when I came to lie
At rest within the ground,
’T were pleasant that in flowery June,
When brooks send up a cheerful tune,
And groves a cheerful sound,
The sexton’s hand, my grave to make,
The rich, green mountain turf should break.A...
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Stand here by my side and turn, I pray,
On the lake below thy gentle eyes;
The clouds hang over it, heavy and gray,
And dark and silent the water lies;
And out of that frozen mist the snow
In wavering flakes begins to flow;
Flake after flake
They sink in the dark and silent lake.See how in a living swarm...