Page:Landon in Literary Gazette 1832.pdf/15

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Of Sir Walter Scott's legal and official career, or of his pecuniary circumstances, it is not for us to speak; and we congratulate ourselves that the touching strain which we now annex from the pen of L. E. L. enables us to leave these matters of worldly record to others:—

Our sky has lost another star, The earth has claimed its own, And into dread eternity A glorious one is gone. He who could give departed things So much of light and breath, He is himself now with the past— Gone forth from life to death.

It is a most unblessed grave That has no mourner near; The meanest turf the wild flowers hide Has some familiar tear: But kindred sorrow is forgot Amid the general gloom; Grief is religion felt for him Whose temple is his tomb.

Thou of the future and the past, How shall we honour thee? Shall we build up a pyramid Amid the pathless sea? Shall we bring red gold from the east, And marble from the west, And carved porphyry, that the fane Be worthy of its guest?

Or shall we seek thy native land, And choose some ancient hill, To be thy statue, finely wrought With all the sculptor's skill? Methinks, as there are common signs To every common wo, That we should do some mighty thing To mark who lies below.

But this is folly: thou needst not The sculpture or the shrine; The heart is the sole monument For memories like thine. The pyramids in Egypt rose To mark some monarch's fame: Imperishable is the tomb, But what the founder's name?