To summer suns and winter moons
Prepare to bid a long adieu,
Autumnal seasons shall return
And spring shall bloom, but not for you.
Why so perplext with cares and toil
To rest upon this darksome road,
'Tis but a thin, a thirsty soil,
A barren and a bleak abode.
Constrain'd to dwell with pain and care,
These dregs of life are bought too dear,
'Tis better far to die than bear
The torments of another year.[111]
Subjected to perpetual ills
A thousand deaths around us grow,
The frost the tender blossom kills,
And roses wither as they blow.
Cold nipping winds thy fruits assail,
The infant[112] apple seeks the ground,
The peaches fall, the cherries fail,
The grape receives a fatal wound.
The breeze that gently ought to blow
Swells to a storm and rends the main,
The sun that charm'd the grass to grow
Turns hostile and consumes the plain;
The mountains waste, the shores decay,
Once purling streams are dead and dry—
'Twas nature's work—'tis nature's play,
And nature says that all must die.
Yon' flaming lamp, the source of light,
In chaos dark shall shroud his beam
And leave the world to mother night,
A farce, a phantom, or a dream.
What now is young must soon be old,
Whate'er we love, we soon must leave,
'Tis now too hot, 'tis now too cold—
To live is nothing but to grieve.
How bright the morn her course begun,
No mists bedimm'd the solar sphere—
The clouds arise—they shade the sun,
For nothing can be constant here.