Library of the best American literature / Containing the lives of our authors in story form, their portraits, their homes, and their personal traits, how they worked and what they wrote; choice selections from eminent writers, embracing great American poets and novelists, foremost women in American letters, distinguished critics and essayists, our national humorists, noted journalists and magazine contributors, popular writers for young people, great orators and public lecturers

by Unknown

A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave,

Man passeth from life to his rest in the grave.

The leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade,

Be scattered around, and together be laid;

And the young and the old, and the low and the high,

Shall molder to dust, and together shall lie.

The infant a mother attended and loved;

The mother that infant’s affection who proved;

The husband that mother and infant who blessed,—

Each, all, are away to their dwellings of rest.