O man! hold thee on in courage of soul Through the stormy shades of thy worldly way, And the billows of cloud that around thee roll Shall sleep in the light of a wondrous day, _10 Where Hell and Heaven shall leave thee free To the universe of destiny. This world is the nurse of all we know, This world is the mother of all we feel, And the coming of death is a fearful blow _15 To a brain unencompassed with nerves of steel; When all that we know, or feel, or see, Shall pass like an unreal mystery. The secret things of the grave are there, Where all but this frame must surely be, _20 Though the fine-wrought eye and the wondrous ear No longer will live to hear or to see All that is great and all that is strange In the boundless realm of unending change. Who telleth a tale of unspeaking death? _25 Who lifteth the veil of what is to come? Who painteth the shadows that are beneath The wide-winding caves of the peopled tomb? Or uniteth the hopes of what shall be With the fears and the love for that which we see? _30 *** A SUMMER EVENING CHURCHYARD. LECHLADE, GLOUCESTERSHIRE. [Composed September, 1815. Published with "Alastor", 1816.] The wind has swept from the wide atmosphere Each vapour that obscured the sunset's ray; And pallid Evening twines its beaming hair In duskier braids around the languid eyes of Day: Silence and Twilight, unbeloved of men, _5 Creep hand in hand from yon obscurest glen. They breathe their spells towards the departing day, Encompassing the earth, air, stars, and sea; Light, sound, and motion own the potent sway, Responding to the charm with its own mystery. _10 The winds are still, or the dry church-tower grass Knows not their gentle motions as they pass. Thou too, aereal Pile! whose pinnacles Point from one shrine like pyramids of fire, Obeyest in silence their sweet solemn spells, _15 Clothing in hues of heaven thy dim and distant spire, Around whose lessening and invisible height Gather among the stars the clouds of night. The dead are sleeping in their sepulchres: And, mouldering as they sleep, a thrilling sound, _20 Half sense, half thought, among the darkness stirs, Breathed from their wormy beds all living things around, And mingling with the still night and mute sky Its awful hush is felt inaudibly. Thus solemnized and softened, death is mild _25 And terrorless as this serenest night: Here could I hope, like some inquiring child Sporting on graves, that death did hide from human sight Sweet secrets, or beside its breathless sleep That loveliest dreams perpetual watch did keep. _30 *** TO --. [Published with "Alastor", 1816. See Editor's Note.] DAKRTSI DIOISO POTMON 'APOTMON.