Corinne’s Chant in the Vicinity of Naples
Translations, From the French
“If through the years we're not to do
Much finer deeds than we have done;
If we must merely wander through
Time's garden, idling in the sun;
If there is nothing big ahead,
Why do we fear to join the dead?Unless to-morrow means that we
Shall do some needed service here;
That tasks are waiting you and me
That will be lost, save we appear;
Then why this dreadful thought of sorrow
That we may never see to-morrow?”
Source: Just Folks (1917), Living, first and second stanzas.
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Edgar Guest 61
American writer 1881–1959Related quotes
Song lyrics, The Dreaming (1982)
Cornstalk to Shawnee council after the Battle of Point Pleasant (October 1774), as quoted in I Have Spoken : American History through the voices of the Indians (1971) by Virginia Irving Armstrong, p. 27
Variant: Let us kill all our women and children, and go fight till we die.
As quoted in Best Little Stories from Virginia (2003) by C. Brian Kelly, p. 74
Context: What shall we do now? the big knife is coming on us and we shall all be killed. Now we must fight or we are done. Then let us kill all our women and children and go fight until we die? I shall go and make peace!
Source: Letters of Thomas Jefferson
"Early Warnings," from Lyra Innocentium (1846).
(1837 1) (Vol. 49) Songs - I.
The Monthly Magazine