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Ah, happy hills! ah, pleasing shade! Ah, fields beloved in vain! Where once my careless childhood stray'd, A stranger yet to pain! I feel the gales that from ye blow A momentary bliss bestow.

Thomas Gray

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Thomas Gray
Age: 54 †
Born: 1716
Born: December 26
Died: 1771
Died: July 30
Literary Critic
Poet
London
England
Happy
Hills
Stray
Pain
Beloved
Bestow
Feel
Vain
Gale
Feels
Stranger
Momentary
Blow
Pleasing
Childhood
Careless
Fields
Shade
Happiness
Bliss
Gales

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One principal characteristic of vice in the present age is the contempt of fame.
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To Contemplation's sober eye. / Such is the race of Man.
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Sweet is the breath of vernal shower,/ The bee's collected treasure sweet,/ Sweet music's melting fall, but sweeter yet/ The still small voice of gratitude.
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Chill penury repress'd their noble rage, And froze the genial current of the soul.
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Nor grandeur hear with a disdainful smile The short and simple annals of the poor.
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But knowledge to their eyes her ample page Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll Chill Penury repressed their noble rage, And froze the genial current of the soul.
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Along the cool sequestered vale of life, They kept the noiseless tenour of their way.
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Can storied urn, or animated bust Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath? Can Honour's voice provoke the silent dust, Or Flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of Death?
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Youth smiles without any reason. It is one of its chiefest charms.
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The different steps and degrees of education may be compared to the artificer's operations upon marble it is one thing to dig it out of the quarry, and another to square it, to give it gloss and lustre, call forth every beautiful spot and vein, shape it into a column, or animate it into a statue.
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Scatter plenty o'er a smiling land.
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Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife Their sober wishes never learn'd to stray Along the cool sequester'd vale of life They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.
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E'en from the tomb the voice of nature cries, E'en in our ashes live their wonted fires.
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To each his suff'rings all are men, Condemn'd alike to groan,- The tender for another's pain, Th' unfeeling for his own. Yet ah! why should they know their fate, Since sorrow never comes too late, And happiness too swiftly flies? Thought would destroy their paradise. No more where ignorance is bliss, 'T is folly to be wise.
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Alas, regardless of their doom, the little victims play! No sense have they of ills to come nor care beyond today.
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To brisk notes in cadence beating, glance their many-twinkling feet.
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The applause of list'ning senates to command, The threats of pain and ruin to despise, To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land, And read their history in a nation's eyes.
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The hues of bliss more brightly glow, Chastis'd by sabler tints of woe.
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To contemplation's sober eye, Such is the race of man And they that creep, and they that fly, Shall end where they began, Alike the busy and the gay, But flutter through life's little day.
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