The various kind of grief; the faults of age; And Death's dread character--invite my song." And, first th' importance of our end survey'd. Friends counsel quick dismission of our grief: 300 Mistaken kindness! our hearts heal too soon. Are they more kind than He, who struck the blow? Who bid it do his errand in our hearts, And banish peace, till nobler guests arrive, And bring it back, a true and endless peace? Calamities are friends: as glaring day Of these unnumber'd lustres robs our sight; Prosperity puts out unnumber'd thoughts Of import high, and light divine, to man. The man how blest, who, sick of gaudy scenes, 310 (Scenes apt to thrust between us and ourselves!) Is led by choice to take his favourite walk, Beneath death's gloomy, silent, cypress shades, Unpierced by vanity's fantastic ray; To read his monuments, to weigh his dust, Visit his vaults, and dwell among the tombs! Lorenzo[21] read with me Narcissa's stone; (Narcissa was thy favourite) let us read Her moral stone; few doctors preach so well; Few orators so tenderly can touch 320 The feeling heart. What pathos in the date! Apt words can strike: and yet in them we see Faint images of what we here enjoy. What cause have we to build on length of life? Temptations seize, when fear is laid asleep; 325 And ill foreboded is our strongest guard. See from her tomb, as from an humble shrine, Truth, radiant goddess! sallies on my soul, And puts delusion's dusky train to flight; Dispels the mists our sultry passions raise, From objects low, terrestrial, and obscene; And shows the real estimate of things; 332 Which no man, unafflicted, ever saw; Pulls off the veil from virtue's rising charms; Detects temptation in a thousand lies. Truth bids me look on men, as autumn leaves, And all they bleed for, as the summer's dust, Driven by the whirlwind: lighted by her beams, I widen my horizon, gain new powers, See things invisible, feel things remote, 340 Am present with futurities; think nought To man so foreign, as the joys possess'd; Nought so much his, as those beyond the grave. No folly keeps its colour in her sight; Pale worldly wisdom loses all her charms; In pompous promise, from her schemes profound, If future fate she plans, 'tis all in leaves, Like Sibyl, unsubstantial, fleeting bliss! At the first blast it vanishes in air. Not so, celestial: would'st thou know, Lorenzo! 350 How differ worldly wisdom, and divine? Just as the waning and the waxing moon. More empty worldly wisdom every day; And every day more fair her rival shines. When later, there's less time to play the fool. Soon our whole term for wisdom is expired (Thou know'st she calls no council in the grave):