Oh! for a heart that seeks the sacred gloom That hovers round the precincts of the _tomb_! While fancy, musing there, sees visions bright,-- In death discovering life, in darkness, light. What though the chilling blasts of winter’s day Forbid the garden longer to be gay? Of winter yet I’ll not refuse to sing, Thus to be followed by eternal spring. _Leigh Richmond._ What is the _Grave_ of Pride? Is it to lie ’Neath sculptured marble, where the night-winds sigh Through solemn arches, and ’mid pillars tall, The while the pallid moonbeams coldly fall On shrine, and urn, and “animated bust,” The vain memorials all of “dust to dust?” Is it to lie with hands uprear’d in prayer, As many a warrior rests in sculpture rare; His banner floating o’er the chisell’d stone, ’Neath which, long ages since, he laid him down, To fear no battle-cry, nor trumpet call, Till on his startled ear the peal shall fall, That from the storied _tomb_, or daisied sod, Death’s sleepers shall awake to meet their God? Then will it seek not, if in minster-pile, While music roll’d through each time-honour’d aisle, And choral hymnings swell the flood of sound, That rose and fell through all the vaults around; Or if beneath some village yew-tree’s shade, The child of earth to his long rest were laid. The marble _tomb_ must yield its treasured trust, The grass-grown _grave_ give up the sleeping dust. _Mary Milner._ I like that ancient Saxon phrase which calls The burial-ground, God’s Acre! It is just; It consecrates each _grave_ within its walls, And breathes a benison o’er the sleeping dust. Into its furrows shall we all be cast, In the sure faith that we shall rise again At the great harvest, when the Archangel’s blast Shall winnow, like a fan, the chaff and grain. _Longfellow._ ’Tis a blessing to live, but a greater to die, And the best of the world, is its path to the sky,-- Be it gloomy or bright, for the life that He gave Let us thank Him--but blessed be God for the _grave_! ’Tis the end of our toil, ’tis the crown of our bliss, ’Tis the portal of happiness--aye, but for this, How hopeless were sorrow, how narrow were love, If they looked not from earth to the rapture above! _J. K. Mitchell._