English Poetry II: From Collins to Fitzgerald.
The Harvard Classics. 1909–14. |
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| 423. The Scholar |
| | | Robert Southey (1774–1843) |
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| MY days among the Dead are past; | |
| Around me I behold, | |
| Where’er these casual eyes are cast, | |
| The mighty minds of old: | |
| My never-failing friends are they, | 5 |
| With whom I converse day by day. | |
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| With them I take delight in weal | |
| And seek relief in woe; | |
| And while I understand and feel | |
| How much to them I owe, | 10 |
| My cheeks have often been bedew’d | |
| With tears of thoughtful gratitude. | |
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| My thoughts are with the Dead; with them | |
| I live in long-past years, | |
| Their virtues love, their faults condemn, | 15 |
| Partake their hopes and fears, | |
| And from their lessons seek and find | |
| Instruction with an humble mind. | |
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| My hopes are with the Dead; anon | |
| My place with them will be, | 20 |
| And I with them shall travel on | |
| Through all Futurity; | |
| Yet leaving here a name, I trust, | |
| That will not perish in the dust. | |
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