"Nay, do not dream, designer dark, Thou hast portray'd or hit thy theme entire; I, hoverer of late by this dark valley, by its confines, having glimpses of it, Here enter lists with thee, claiming my right to make a symbol too. For I have seen many wounded soldiers die, After dread suffering--have seen their lives pass off with smiles, And I have watch'd the death-hours of the old; and seen the infant die; The rich, with all his nurses and his doctors; And then the poor, in meagreness and poverty; And I myself for long, O Death, have breath'd my every breath Amid the nearness and the silent thought of thee. "And out of these and thee, I make a scene, a song (not fear of thee, Nor gloom's ravines, nor bleak, nor dark--for I do not fear thee, Nor celebrate the struggle, or contortion, or hard-tied knot), Of the broad blessed light, and perfect air, with meadows, rippling tides, and trees and flowers and grass, And the low hum of living breeze--and in the midst God's beautiful eternal right hand, Thee, holiest minister of Heaven--thee, envoy, usherer, guide at last of all, Rich, florid, loosener of the stricture-knot called life, Sweet, peaceful, welcome Death." This is indeed a change from the idea of Death as King of Terrors, as "spectre feared of man". (_In Memoriam_) The Greek idea, at its best, seems to have been half-way between the two extremes. It regarded death with more or less equanimity, as being certainly not the greatest evil--no king of terrors--but merely an emissary of greater Powers, to whose will we must bow, though with dignity: "He that is a man in good earnest must not be so mean as to whine for life, and grasp intemperately at old age; let him leave this point to Providence."--(Plato: _Gorgias_) Sophocles has the same thought, with an added touch of Hamlet-like irritation about the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune: "It is a shame to crave long life, when troubles Allow a man no respite. What delight Bring days, one with another, setting us Forward or backward on our path to death? I would not take the fellow at a gift Who warms himself with unsubstantial hopes; But bravely to live on, or bravely end, Is due to gentle breeding. I have said."--(_Ajax_) Cicero voices the same pagan feeling, in the contented language of a rather tired, wise old man: "I look forward to my dissolution as to a secure haven, where I shall at length find a happy repose from the fatigues of a long voyage."--(_De Senectute_)