No; fame's a breath, it cannot worth fupply,
Nor yield you comfort when you come to die *;
In my dark realms all oppofites agree,

The heirs of wealth, and fons of poverty.

Whose tomb is this? It fays 'tis Mira's tomb,
Pluck'd from the world in beauty's faireft bloom:
Attend, ye fair, ye thoughtless, and ye gay!
For Mira dy'd upon her nuptial day!

The grave, cold bridegroom! clafp'd her in his arms
And kindred worms deftroy'd her pleasing charms t.
In yonder tomb the old Avaro lies;

(Once he was rich, the world efteem'd him wife)
Schemes unaccomplish'd labour'd in his mind,
And all his thoughts were to this world confin'd ;
Death came unlook'd for, from his grafping hands
Down dropt his bags, and mortgages of lands.

Beneath that sculptur'd pompous marble ftone
Lies youthful Florio aged twenty-one;

Fame is the fhade of immortality

And in itfelf a fhadow

All our ambition, death defeats.

YOUNG.

Beauty at beft is but a fading flower;

Difeafe and death deftroy it in an hour.

Gold was his god, and earth the only heaven he hoped

for

B

Cropp'd

Crop'd like a flower he wither'd in his bloom,
Tho' flatt'ring life had promis'd years to come,
Ye filken fons, ye Florio's of the age!

Who tread in giddy maze, life's flow'ry ftage,
Mark here the end of man, in Florio fee,

What you
There low in duft the vain Hortenfio lies,
Whofe fplendour was beheld with envious eyes;

and all the fons of earth must be.

Titles and arms his pompous marble grace,
With a long hift'ry of his noble race:
Still after death his vanity furvives,
And on his tomb, all of Hortenfio lives!
Around me, as I turn my wand'ring eyes,
Unumber'd graves in awful profpect rife,
Whofe flones fay only when their owners dy'd,
If young, or aged, and to whom ally'd;
On others, pompous epitaphs are spread,
In mem'ry of the virtu's of the dead * ;
Vain wafte of praife! fince flatt'ring or fincere,
The judgment-day alone will make appear t

How

*Praifes on tombs are tiles vainly spent, A man's good name is his beft monument.

+ Amidst all our thirst for pofthumous fame, this thought fhould frike us. He who made us, knows best what we

truly

How filent is this little fpot of ground! How melancholy looks each object round! Here man diffolv'd, in fhatter'd ruinlies So faft afleep-as if no more to rife;

'Tis ftrange to think, how these dead bones can live, Leap into form, and with new heat revive!

Or how this trodden earth to life fhall wake,

Know its own place, its former figure take;

But whence thefe doubts? when the last trumpet founds
Thro' Heav'n's expanse, to earth's remotest bounds,
The dead fhall quit thefe tenements of clay,
And view again the long extinguish'd day :
Chear'd with this pleafing hope, I fafely trust
Th' Almighty's pow'r to raise me from the duit *;
On his unfailing promifes rely,

And all the horrors of the grave defy;

Death! where's thy fting? Grave! where's thy victory t?

truly are, whether righteous or wicked; and will acquit or condemn us accordingly, at the laft great day, before an effembled world.

*He who did make us out of duft at first,
Both can and will at last from duft restore.

+1 Corinthians xv, 52, 53•

God fpeaketh once, yea twice, but man perceiveth it not in dreams and vifions of the night, when deep fleep fallet upon man. JOB Xxxii. 14.

I dream't, that buried in my fellow-clay, Clofe by a common beggar's fide I lay ; And as fo mean an object fhock'd my pride, Thus like a corpfe of confequence I cried, Scoundrel, be gone, and henceforth touch me not, More manners learn, and at a distance rot. Scoundrel, then with a haughtier tone, cried he, Proud lump of earth! I fcorn thy words and thee; Here all are equal, now my cafe is thine, That, is thy rotting place, and this is mine.

Pride was not made for Man.

Night vifions may befriend. DR, YOUNG,

THE

GRAVE.

BY ROBERT BLAIR.

In the following well-known Poem, (written by a clergyman of Edinburgh, and firft publifhed in the year 1743) many important admonitions are held out, and folemn truths inculcated and enforced.

Most of the characters which mankind fuftain in the prefent ftate; many of the purfuits of men in general here below, together with the vanity and emptiness of every earthly pleafure and enjoyment, are herein pourtrayed in the moft lively and ftriking colours; well deferving the attention. and regard of you, of me, of all. G. W:

The Grave is mine Houfe.

Joв xvii. 30.

The Houfe appointed for all living.

JOB

Joв XXX. 23.

HILE fome affect the fun, and fome the fhade,
Some flee the city, fome the hermitage;

WHILE

Their aims as various as the roads they take
In journeying through life; the task be mine,

B 3