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But for a moment opposite your grate To stand, without great wrong to any one, You might pass for him, and do me great kindness. Or the good Father there, if he be willing To doff his cowl and turn him to the light, He hath a good thick beard, and a stern eye, That would be better still.

Ha! ha! ha! what say ye to it. Father? (Laughing again more violently than at first.)

What means this wild and most unnatural mirth? This lightness of the soul, strange and unsuited To thy unhappy state? it shocks me much. Approaching death brings naught to scare the good, Yet has it wherewithal to awe the boldest: And there are seasons when the lighted soul Is call'd on to look inward on itself In awful seriousness.

Thou dost me wrong; indeed thou dost me wrong. I laugh'd, but, faith! I am not light of soul: And he who most misfortune's scourge hath felt Will tell thee laughter is the child of mis'ry. Ere sin brought wretchedness into the world, The soberness of undisturbed bliss