Entroductory Lines to Book the Third. TO THE GRAVE. HEARKEN, O Grave! beneath me lying; And round thee vibrates the unsolid Of Dreams into the Silence rusheth. But dreams like his whose burning lips Tell me, O Grave! When to thy slave The black-robed laugher Death— And to the Air, Earth, Fire, and Wave, Tell me, shall aught which may be poured And that their tyrannies and terrors, The monsters of their self-sought errors Have had for me no grace? That never flinch'd my fearless Scorn With Folly in the field? That to my naked heart was worn "Man's Welfare' as its shield? That-nor the Banner nor the Band Which venal champions may defend |