Poem by Philip Morin Freneau

On Retirement

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! 

1. On the Death of Dr. Benjamin Franklin
2. Eutaw Springs
3. Death's Epitaph
4. The Vernal Age
5. On the Universality and Other Attributes of the God of Nature

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