Fugitive Poetry. 1600–1878/The Body and the Soul

The Body and the Soul.

What is the body?—fragile, frail As vegetation's tenderest leaf;Transient as April's fitful gale, And as the flashing meteor brief.

What is this soul? eternal mind, Unlimited as thought's vast range,By grovelling matter unconfined— The same, while states and empires change.

When long this miserable frame Has vanished from life's busy scene,This earth shall roll, that sun shall flame, As though this dust had never been.

When suns have waned, and worlds sublime Their final revolutions told,This soul shall triumph over time, As though such orbs had never rolled.