I’ve pac’d the sacred yard, oh death! thy sting,
Expunge from earth the beggar and the king;
A marble monument, a stone foretell,
The characters below, here acted well:
Each grave a warning give, and yet we see,
Few strive to gain a bless’d eternity:
Kindred and neighbours with departing sigh,
Cry, write o’er me, ‘remember all must die!’
Can we these warnings with indifferance view,
And still a life of guilt and sin pursue.
So frail our natures that at times we pray,
At church at morn, yet sin the after day;
Much shall we tremble, when the trumpets sound,
To call us to our God with Angels round.
There shall we tottering hear the just decree,
Of him alone, who can all spirits free:
How oft we find when sickness brings distress,
We wish our sufferings and our crimes were less;
It is our crimes that most our anguish brings,
And paint grim death, with all his bitter stings,
Then erring man if happiness you crave,
Repent and sin no more this side the grave.