Complexionally pleasant? Where the droll,
Whose ev'ry look and gesture was a joke
To clapping theatres and shouting crowds,
And made ev'n thick-lipp'd musing melancholy
To gather up her face into a smile.

Before she was aware? Ah! sullen now,

And dumb as the green turf that covers them.
Where are the mighty thunderbolts of war?
The Roman Caesars, and the Grecian chiefs,

The boast of story? Where the hot-brained youth,
Who the tiara at his pleasure tore

From kings of all the then discover'd globe;

And cried, forsooth, because his arm was hamper'd,

And had not room enough to do its work?
Alas! how slim, dishonorably slim!

And cramm'd into a space we blush to name.
Proud royalty! how alter'd in thy looks!
How blank thy features, and how wan thy hue!
Son of the morning! whither art thou gone?
Where hast thou hid thy many-spangled head,
And the majestic menace of thine eyes,
Felt from afar? Pliant and powerless now,
Like new-born infant wound up in its swathes,

Or victim tumbled flat upon his back,

That throbs beneath the sacrificer's knife:

Mute must thou bear the strife of little tongues,
And coward insults of the base-born crowd,

That grudge a privilege thou never hadst,

The far-famed sculptor, and the laurel'd bard,
Those bold insurances of deathless fame,
Supply their little feeble aids in vain.

The tap'ring pyramid, th' Egyptian's pride,

And wonder of the world, whose spiky top

Has wounded the thick cloud, and long out-liv'd
The angry shaking of the winter's storm;
Yet spent at last by th' injuries of heaven,
Shatter'd with age, and furrow'd o'er with years.
The mystic cone with hieroglyphics crusted,
Gives way. O lamentable sight! At once
The labor of whole ages lumbers down,
A hideous and misshapen length of ruins.
Sepulchral columns wrestle, but in vain,
With all-subduing Time; her cankʼring hand,
With calm deliberate malice, wasteth them:
Worn on the edge of days, the brass consumes,
The busto moulders, and the deep-cut marble,
Unsteady to the steel, gives up its charge.
Ambition, half-convicted of her folly,

Hangs down the head, and reddens at the tale.
Here all the mighty troublers of the earth,
Who swam to sov'reign rule through seas of blood;
Th' oppressive, sturdy, man-destroying villains,
Who ravaged kingdoms, and laid empires waste,
And, in a cruel wantonness of power,

Thinn'd states of half their people, and gave up
To want the rest; now, like a storm that's spent,

Lie hush'd, and meanly sneak behind thy covert.
Vain thought! to hide them from the gen'ral scorn,
That haunts and dogs them, like an injur'd ghost
Implacable. Here too, the petty tyrant,

Whose scant domains geographer ne'er noticed,

And, well for neighb'ring grounds, of arm as short,
Who fix'd his iron talons on the poor,

And gripp'd them like some lordly beast of prey,
Deaf to the forceful cries of gnawing hunger,
And piteous plaintive voice of misery;

(As if a slave was not a shred of nature,

Of the same common nature as his lord);

Now tame and humble, like a child that's whipp'd,

Shakes hands with dust, and calls the worm his kinsman;

Nor pleads his rank and birthright. Under ground

Precedency's a jest; vassal and lord,

Grossly familiar, side by side consume.

When self-esteem, or others' adulation,

Would cunningly persuade us we were something
Above the common level of our kind;

The grave gainsays the smooth-complexion'd flatt'ry,
And with blunt truth acquaints us what we are.
Beauty! thou pretty plaything, dear deceit,

That steals so softly o'er the stripling's heart,

And gives it a new pulse unknown before,
The grave discredits thee: thy charms expunged,

Thy roses faded, and thy lilies soil'd,

What hast thou more to boast of? Will thy lovers

But only hoped for in the peaceful grave,
Of being unmolested and alone.
Arabia's gums, and odoriferous drugs,
And honors by the heralds duly paid
In mode and form, ev'n to a very scruple;
O cruel irony! these come too late;

And only mock whom they meant to honor.
Surely, there's not a dungeon-slave that's buried
In the highway, unshrouded and uncoffin'd,
But lies as soft, and sleeps as sound as he,
Sorry pre-eminence of high descent,
Above the baser born, to rot in state!

The sick man's door, and live upon the dead,
By letting out their persons by the hour

To mimic sorrow when the heart's not sad!
How rich the trappings, now they're all unfurl'd
And glitt'ring in the sun! Triumphant entries
Of conquerors, and coronation pomps,

In glory scarce exceed. Great gluts of people
Retard th' unwieldy show; whilst from the casements,
And houses tops, ranks behind ranks, close wedged,
Hang bellying o'er. But tell us, why this waste?
Why this ado in earthing up a carcase
That's fallen into disgrace, and in the nostril
Smells horrible?-Ye undertakers, tell us,
'Midst all the gorgeous figures you exhibit,
Why is the principal conceal'd, for which
You make this mighty stir.-"Tis wisely done:
What would offend the eye in a good picture,
The painter casts discreetly into shades.

Proud lineage, now how little thou appear'st!
Below the envy of the private man!

Honor, that meddlesome officious ill,

Pursues thee e'en to death, nor there stops short.
Strange persecution! when the grave itself
Is no protection from rude sufferance.

Absurd! to think to overreach the Grave,
And from the wreck of names to rescue ours!
The best-concerted schemes men lay for fame,
Die fast away: only themselves die faster.