ON RETIREMENT
BY HEZEKIAH SALEM A HERMIT’S house beside a stream
With forests planted round,
Whatever it to you may seem
More real happiness I deem
Than if I were a monarch crowned..
A cottage I could call my own
Remote from domes of care;
A little garden, walled with stone,
The wall with ivy overgrown,
A limpid fountain near,.
Would more substantial joys afford,.
More real bliss impart
Than all the wealth that misers hoard,.
Than vanquished worlds, or worlds restored–
Mere cankers of the heart!
Vain, foolish man! how vast thy pride,
How little can your wants supply!–
‘Tis surely wrong to grasp so wide–
You act as if you only had
To triumph–not to die! .
Full Colophon Information
Genre: Poetry
Subjects: Early National Society and Life
Period: 1750-1800
Location: British America
Format: verse
The text of this document of originally published in 1788.
The text of the present edition was prepared from and proofed against Philip Freneau, "On Retirement," in American Poetry. Edited by Percy H. Boynton (New York: C. Scribner's Sons, 1918). All preliminaries and notes have been omitted except those for which the author is responsible. All editorial notes have been omitted except those that indicate significant textual variations. Line and paragraph numbers contained in the source text have been retained. In cases where the source text displays no numbers, numbers are automatically generated. In the header, personal names have been regularized according to the Library of Congress authority files as "Last Name, First Name" for the REG attribute and "First Name Last Name" for the element value. Names have not been regularized in the body of the text.