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 loosed, may rest,
When we shall clearly know and understand,

I think that we shall say, "God knew the best!" May Riley Smith [1842

"THE MOURNERS CAME AT BREAK OF DAY"

THE mourners came at break of day
Unto the garden-sepulcher;

With darkened hearts to weep and pray,
For Him, the loved one buried there.
What radiant light dispels the gloom?
An angel sits beside the tomb.

The earth doth mourn her treasures lost,
All sepulchered beneath the snow;
When wintry winds, and chilling frost
Have laid her summer glories low;

The spring returns, the flowerets bloom-
An angel sits beside the tomb.

A Sea Dirge

Then mourn we not beloved dead,

E'en while we come to weep and pray;
The happy spirit far hath fled

To brighter realms of endless day:
Immortal Hope dispels the gloom!
An angel sits beside the tomb.

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Sarah Flower Adams [1805-1848]

WHAT OF THE DARKNESS?

TO THE HAPPY DEAD PEOPLE

WHAT of the darkness? Is it very fair?

Are there great calms? and find we silence there?
Like soft-shut lilies, all your faces glow

With some strange peace our faces never know,
With some strange faith our faces never dare,—
Dwells it in Darkness? Do you find it there?

Is it a Bosom where tired heads may lie?
Is it a Mouth to kiss our weeping dry?
Is it a Hand to still the pulse's leap?

Is it a Voice that holds the runes of sleep?
Day shows us not such comfort anywhere—
Dwells it in Darkness? Do you find it there?

Out of the Day's deceiving light we call-
Day that shows man so great, and God so small,
That hides the stars, and magnifies the grass-
O is the Darkness too a lying glass!

Or undistracted, do you find truth there?,

What of the Darkness? Is it very fair?

Richard Le Gallienne [1866

A SEA DIRGE

From "The Tempest "

FULL fathom five thy father lies:
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes:

Nothing of him that doth fade,

But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell:
Hark! now I hear them,—
Ding, dong, Bell.

William Shakespeare [1564-1616]

EPITAPHS

I-ON ELIZABETH L. H.

WOULDST thou hear what Man can say
In a little? Reader, stay.

Underneath this stone doth lie
As much Beauty as could die:
Which in life did harbor give
To more Virtue than doth live.
If at all she had a fault,
Leave it buried in this vault.

One name was Elizabeth,

The other, let it sleep with death:

Fitter, where it died, to tell

Than that it lived at all. Farewell.

II-ON SALATHIEL PAVY, A CHILD OF QUEEN ELIZABETH'S

CHAPEL

WEEP with me, all you that read

This little story;

And know, for whom a tear you shed

Death's self is sorry.

'Twas a child that so did thrive

In grace and feature,

As Heaven and Nature seemed to strive
Which owned the creature.

Years he numbered scarce thirteen

When Fates turned cruel,

Yet three filled zodiacs had he been
The stage's jewel;

And did act (what now we moan)

Old men so duly,

As sooth the Parcæ thought him one,

He played so truly.

On the Tombs in Westminster 3295

So, by error, to his fate

They all consented;

But, viewing him since, alas, too late!
They have repented;

And have sought, to give new birth,
In baths to steep him;

But, being so much too good for earth,

Heaven vows to keep him.

SONG

Ben Jonson [1573?-1637]

From "The Devil's Law Case"

ALL the flowers of the spring
Meet to perfume our burying;
These have but their growing prime,
And man does flourish but his time:
Survey our progress from our birth—
We are set, we grow, we turn to earth.
Courts adieu, and all delights,
All bewitching appetites!
Sweetest breath and clearest eye
Like perfumes go out and die;
And consequently this is done
As shadows wait upon the sun.

Vain the ambition of kings

Who seek by trophies and dead things

To leave a living name behind,

And weave but nets to catch the wind.

John Webster [1580?-1625?]

ON THE TOMBS IN WESTMINSTER

MORTALITY, behold and fear!

What a change of flesh is here!

Think how many royal bones

Sleep within this heap of stones;

Here they lie had realms and lands,

Who now want strength to stir their hands;
Where from their pulpits sealed with dust
They preach, "In greatness is no trust."

Here's an acre sown indeed
With the richest royal'st seed
That the earth did e'er suck in,
Since the first man died for sin;

Here the bones of birth have cried,
"Though gods they were, as men they died."

Here are sands, ignoble things,

Dropped from the ruined sides of kings.

Here's a world of pomp and state,

Buried in dust, once dead by fate.

Francis Beaumont [1584-1616]

EPITAPH ON THE COUNTESS DOWAGER
OF PEMBROKE

UNDERNEATH this sable hearse
Lies the subject of all verse:
Sidney's sister, Pembroke's mother:
Death, ere thou hast slain another,
Fair, and learned, and good as she,
Time shall throw a dart at thee.

Marble piles let no man raise
To her name: in after days,
Some kind woman born as she,
Reading this, like Niobe

Shall turn marble, and become

Both her mourner and her tomb.

William Browne [1591-1643?]

AN EPITAPH INTENDED FOR HIMSELF

LIKE thee I once have stemmed the sea of life, Like thee have languished after empty joys, Like thee have labored in the stormy strife, Been grieved for trifles, and amused with toys.

Forget my frailties; thou art also frail:

Forgive my lapses; for thyself may'st fall: Nor read unmoved my artless tender taleI was a friend, O man, to thee, to all.

James Beattie [1735-1803]