Portal:Poetry/poem archive/Week 47 2006

Epitaph By Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Stop, Christian passer-by : Stop, child of God, And read, with gentle breast. Beneath this sod A poet lies, or that which once seem'd he— O, lift one thought in prayer for S. T. C.— That he who many a year with toil of breath Found death in life, may here find life in death: Mercy for praise--to be forgiven for fame— He ask'd, and hoped through Christ. Do thou the same.

NOTE: "Mercy for praise" — in the sense of "mercy instead of praise"

November 9, 1833, published 1834