Herman Melville,
Clarel — Part 1, Canto 40: The Mounds
(1876)
“ But if at this spent man's death-bed Some kind soul kneeled and chapter read-- Ah, own! to moderns death is drear, 55 So drear: we die, we make no sign, We acquiesce in any cheer-- No rite we seek, no rite decline. ”
Herman Melville,
Clarel — Part 1, Canto 40: The Mounds
(1876)
“ Through vocal word or vital cheer: 30 A stranger, but less strange made here, Less distant. Whom life held apart-- Life, whose cross-purposes make shy-- Death yields without reserve of heart To meditation. ”
