Life and Existence

Seek out—less often sought than found— A soldier’s grave, for thee the best; Then look around, and choose thy ground, And take thy rest.

To have seen better days, as who has not Who has seen yesterday?

The “good old times”—all times when old are good— Are gone.

The best of prophets of the future is the past.

Oh, talk not to me of a name great in story; The days of our youth are the days of our glory; And the myrtle and ivy of sweet two-and-twenty Are worth all your laurels, though ever so plenty.

That happiness for man—the hungry sinner!— Since Eve ate apples, much depends on dinner.

’Tis strange the mind, that very fiery particle, Should let itself be snuff’d out by an article.

A lady of “a certain age,” which means Certainly aged.

And heard Troy doubted; time will doubt of Rome.

What, silent still? and silent all? Ah! no;—the voices of the dead Sound like a distant torrent’s fall.

Eternal summer gilds them yet, But all, except their sun, is set.

Man, being reasonable, must get drunk; The best of life is but intoxication.

There’s nought, no doubt, so much the spirit calms As rum and true religion.

Sorrow is knowledge: they who know the most Must mourn the deepest o’er the fatal truth, The Tree of Knowledge is not that of Life.

So we’ll go no more a-roving So late into the night, Though the heart be still as loving, And the moon be still as bright. For the sword outwears its sheath, And the soul wears out the breast, And the heart must pause to breathe, And love itself have rest. Though the night was made for loving, And the day returns too soon, Yet we’ll go no more a-roving By the light of the moon.

My boat is on the shore, And my bark is on the sea; But, before I go, Tom Moore, Here’s a double health to thee! Here’s a sigh to those who love me, And a smile to those who hate; And, whatever sky’s above me, Here’s a heart for every fate.

My boat is on the shore, And my bark is on the sea; But, before I go, Tom Moore, Here’s a double health to thee! Here’s a sigh to those who love me, And a smile to those who hate; And, whatever sky’s above me, Here’s a heart for every fate.

Though the day of my destiny’s over, And the star of my fate hath declined.

And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword, Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!

And I have loved thee, Ocean! and my joy Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be Borne, like thy bubbles, onward: from a boy I wanton’d with thy breakers.

Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow— Such as creation’s dawn beheld, thou rollest now.

Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty’s form Glasses itself in tempests.

He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan, Without a grave, unknell’d, uncoffin’d, and unknown.

Of its own beauty is the mind diseased.