 | The Earl of Westmorland |  |
156
SCENE VII.
Funeral Procession, and Dirge.
I.
Wretched mortals, doom'd to goThrough the vale of death and woe!
Let us travel sad and slow.
II.
Care and Sickness, Toil and Pain,Here their restless vigils keep:
Sighs are all the winds that blow,
Tears are all the streams that flow!
Virtue hopes reward in vain—
The gentlest lot she can obtain,
Is but to sit and weep!
III.
Ye dreary mansions of enduring sleep,Where pale mortality lies dark and deep!
Thou silent, though insatiate Grave,
Gorged with the beauteous and the brave,
Close, close thy maw—thy feast is o'er,
Time and death can give no more!
IV.
In Rowena thou hastThy consummate repast!
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All we held of Heaven is thine!
Time and death no more can gain—
They have all perfection slain!
O Grave, thy festival is o'er;
The beggar'd world can give no more!
Song of Consolation.
I.
Ye desolate mortals who stray,
Dark, devious, and wilfully blind;
O turn, and distinguish the way
That leads to the bliss of mankind!
Dark, devious, and wilfully blind;
O turn, and distinguish the way
That leads to the bliss of mankind!
The titles ye falsely assign,
With their symbols are ever at strife;
And death by appointment divine,
Is our birth and our portal to life.
With their symbols are ever at strife;
And death by appointment divine,
Is our birth and our portal to life.
II.
The Framer of Nature from chaos and night,
Who drew yon fair system of order and light,
On extremes hath the plan of his universe built,
On frailty perfection, and pardon on guilt;
And through the short transience of death and of pain,
Appoints human weakness to rise and to reign.
Who drew yon fair system of order and light,
On extremes hath the plan of his universe built,
On frailty perfection, and pardon on guilt;
And through the short transience of death and of pain,
Appoints human weakness to rise and to reign.
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'Tis Virtue, 'tis Virtue, o'er grief and the grave,
That rises secure, and sublime;
The prize that Eternity watches to save
From the wrecks and the ruins of time!
That rises secure, and sublime;
The prize that Eternity watches to save
From the wrecks and the ruins of time!
| The Earl of Westmorland | |