Edward Young (1683 – 1765)
English poet, best remembered for Night Thoughts.
By all means use some time to be alone.
The knell, the shroud, the mattock, and the grave,
The deep damp vault, the darkness and the worm.
Beautiful as sweet!
And young as beautiful! and soft as young!
And gay as soft! and innocent as gay.
Lovely in death the beauteous ruin lay;
And if in death still lovely, lovelier there;
Far lovelier! pity swells the tide of love.
Much learning shows how little mortals know;
Much wealth, how little worldlings can enjoy.
An undevout astronomer is mad.
Life is the desert, life the solitude;
Death joins us to the great majority.
Think naught a trifle, though it small appear;
Small sands the mountain, moments make the year,
And trifles life.
The man of wisdom is the man of years.
How commentators each dark passage shun,
And hold their farthing candle to the sun.
Friendship's the wine of life; but friendship new
(Not such was his) is neither strong nor pure.
Poor pensioner on the bounties of an hour.
And feels a thousand deaths in fearing one.
Whose yesterdays look backwards with a smile.
Life's cares are comforts; such by Heav'n design'd;
He that hath none must make them, or be wretched.
Death loves a shining mark, a signal blow.
Unlearned men of books assume the care,
As eunuchs are the guardians of the fair.
In records that defy the tooth of time.
The course of Nature is the art of God.
A friend is worth all hazards we can run.