YE Muses, pour the pitying tear
For Pollio snatch'd away;
O! had he liv'd another year!-
'He had not died to-day'.
O! were he born to bless mankind,
In virtuous times of yore,
Heroes themselves had fallen behind!-
'Whene'er he went before'.
How sad the groves and plains appear,
And sympathetic sheep;
Even pitying hills would drop a tear!-
'If hills could learn to weep'.
His bounty in exalted strain
Each bard might well display;
Since none implor'd relief in vain!-
'That went reliev'd away'.
And hark! I hear the tuneful throng
His obsequies forbid,
He still shall live, shall live as long!-
'As ever dead man did'.
Oliver Goldsmith
http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/on-the-death-of-the-right-hounourable/
