Poems of Letitia Elizabeth Landon (L. E. L.) in Fraser’s Magazine, 1830/The Dead
Fraser’s Magazine, July, 1830, page 643
THE DEAD.
A spirit doth arise
From the ashes of the dead,
Holy as if the skies
Thrice sacred influence shed.
There ethereal hopes are born,
Such as sanctify the earth—
The noblest wreath e'er worn,
Owes to the grave its birth.
For we think upon the dead;
The glorious, and the good:
And the thought where they have led
Stirs the life-blood like a flood;
Where the pure bright moon hath shed
The light which bids it rise,
Towards the heaven o'er its head;
Even such our sympathies.
Is it some hero's grave,
Who for his country died?
Then honour to the brave,
We would be proud to rest beside.
Is it some sage, whose mind
Is as a beacon light
To save and guide his kind,
Amid their mental night?
Some poet who hath sung
The griefs o'er which he wept;
The rose where rain hath clung,
That fresh and sweet is kept?
Some martyr who hath sealed
With his blood, his faith divine;
That ever men should yield
To their passions, God's own shrine?
Who can think on men like these?
Nor feel that in them dwell,
The highest energies;
And a hope unquenchable:
While the grave an altar seems,
For the most exalted creed,
Till resolves that were as dreams,
End in honourable deed.
Plant the laurel on the grave,
There the spirit’s hope hath fed,
By the good, the great, the brave,—
Be honour to the dead.
L. E. L.