"Weep not! Life the hired nurse is, holding us a little space;
Death, the mother who doth take us back into our proper place."
"Gone, with all their gauds and glories: gone, like peasants, are the Kings,
Whereunto this earth was witness, whereof all her record rings."
"For the body, daily wasting, is not seen to waste away,
Until wasted; as in water set a jar of unbaked clay."
"And day after day man goeth near and nearer to his fate,
As step after step the victim thither where its slayers wait."
"Like as a plank of drift-wood
Tossed on the watery main,
Another plank encountered,
Meets,—touches,—parts again;
So tossed, and drifting ever,
On life's unresting sea,
Men meet, and greet, and sever,
Parting eternally."
"Halt, traveller! rest i' the shade: then up and leave it!
Stay, Soul! take fill of love; nor losing, grieve it!"
"Each beloved object born
Sets within the heart a thorn,
Bleeding, when they be uptorn."
"If thine own house, this rotting frame, doth wither,
Thinking another's lasting—goest thou thither?"
"Meeting makes a parting sure,
Life is nothing but death's door."