farce the boastful hero plays,
Virtue alone has majesty in death;
And greater still, the more the tyrant frowns.
! he severely frown'd on thee:
"No warning given! unceremonious fate!
A sudden rush from life's meridian joys!
A wrench from all we love, from all we are!
A restless bed of pain! a plunge opaque
Beyond conjecture, feeble Nature's dread!
Strong Reason's shudder at the dark unknown!
A sun extinguish'd, a just opening grave!
And, O! the last, last — what? (can words express,
Thought reach it?) the last — silence of a friend!"
Where are those horrors, that amazement where,
This hideous group of ills, which singly shock,
Demand from man? — I thought him man till now.