Life is a span, a fleeting hour

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General information

This is an hymn by Anne Steele, 1760, entitled To a friend, on the death of a child.

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Text and translations

English.png English text

1. Life is a span, a fleeting hour,
How soon the vapor flies!
Man is a tender, transient flower,
That even in blooming dies.

2. Death spreads like winter's frozen arms,
And beauty smiles no more:
Ah! where are now those rising charms
Which pleased our eyes before?

 

3. The once loved form now cold and dead,
Each mournful thought employs;
And nature weeps her comforts fled,
And withered all her joys.

4. But wait the interposing gloom,
And lo, stern winter flies;
And dressed in beauty's fairest bloom,
The flowery tribes arise.

 

5. Hope looks beyond the bounds of time,
When what we now deplore,
Shall rise in full immortal prime,
And bloom to fade no more.

6. Then cease, fond nature, cease thy tears,
Religion points on high;
There everlasting spring appears,
And joys that cannot die.

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