Songs 4

¹How still and peaceful is the grave!

where, life’s vain tumults past,

Th’ appointed house, by Heav’n’s decree,

receives us all at last.

²The wicked there from troubling cease,

their passions rage no more;

And there the weary pilgrim rests

from all the toils he bore.

³There rest the pris’ners, now releas’d

from slav’ry’s sad abode;

No more they hear th’ oppressor’s voice,

or dread the tyrant’s rod.

⁴There servants, masters, small and great,

partake the same repose;

And there, in peace, the ashes mix

of those who once were foes.

⁵All, levell’d by the hand of Death,

lie sleeping in the tomb;

Till God in judgment calls them forth,

to meet their final doom.