Content thyself to be obscurely good.
When vice prevails and impious men bear away,
The post of read more

Content thyself to be obscurely good.
When vice prevails and impious men bear away,
The post of honor is a private station.

Some write their wrongs in marble: he more just,
Stoop'd down serene and wrote them on the dust,
read more

Some write their wrongs in marble: he more just,
Stoop'd down serene and wrote them on the dust,
Trod under foot, the sport of every wind,
Swept from the earth and blotted from his mind,
There, secret in the grave, he bade them lie,
And grieved they could not 'scape the Almighty eye.

Obscurity and competence: That is the life that is worth living.

Obscurity and competence: That is the life that is worth living.

Yet was he but a squire of low degree.

Yet was he but a squire of low degree.

How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!
The world forgetting, by the world forgot.

How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!
The world forgetting, by the world forgot.

Like beauteous flowers which vainly waste their scent
Of odours in unhaunted deserts.

Like beauteous flowers which vainly waste their scent
Of odours in unhaunted deserts.

Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Darkness is to space what silence is to sound, i.e., the interval.

Darkness is to space what silence is to sound, i.e., the interval.

Thus let me live, unseen, unknown,
Thus unlamented let me die;
Steal from the world, and not read more

Thus let me live, unseen, unknown,
Thus unlamented let me die;
Steal from the world, and not a stone
Tell where I lie.