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Death’s shafts fly thick;—Here falls the vilage-swain
And there his pamper’d lord.—The cup goes round;
And who so artful as to put it by?
’Tis long since death had the majority;
Yet strange! the living lay it not to heart.
See yonder maker of the dead man’s bed,
The sexton, hoary-headed chronicle,
Of hard unmeaning face, down which ne’er stole
A gentle tear; with mattoc in his hand
Digs thro’ whole rows of kindred and acquaintance,
By far his juniors.—Scarce a skull’s cast up,
But well he knows its Owner, and can tell
Some passage of his life.—Thus hand in hand
The sot has walk’d with Death twice twenty years;
And yet, ne’er Yonker on the green laughs louder,
Or clubs a smuttier tale:—When Drunkards meet,
None sings a merrier catch, or lends a hand
More willing to his cup.—Poor wretch! he minds not
That soon some trusty Brother of the trade
Shall do for him what he has done for thousands.

On this side, and on that, men see their friends
Drop off, like leaves in autumn; yet launch out
Into fantastic schemes which the long Livers
In the world’s hale and undegenerate days,
Could scarce have leisure for.—Fools that we are,
Never to think of Death and of ourselves
At the same time: as if to learn to die
Were no concern of ours—Oh! more than sottish
For creatures of a Day, in gamesome mood,
To frolic on Eternity’s dark brink
Unapprehensive; when, for ought we know
The very first swoln Surge shall sweep us in.
Think we, or think we not, Time hurries on
With a resistless unremitting stream;
Yet treads more soft than e’er did midnight-thief,
That slides his hand under the Miser’s pillow
And carries off his prize.—What is this World?