On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
Some pious drops the closing eye requires;
E'en from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,
E'en in our ashes live their wonted fires.
These lines have been extracted from "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard", composed by Thomas Gray, an eighteenth century poet.
Here Gray suggests the universal truth that every dying man wants his people to remember him.
In these lines the poet supports the raising of the tombs for the dead villagers. He argues that every human being wants to be remembered after death. In the foregoing stanzas, the poet has glorified the simplicity of the villagers. Then, he passes on from the particular to the general in order to establish the fact that these buried rustic people should not be blamed for having the desire to live in the minds of the living people. Here the poet's own desire has been reflected. In the next few stanzas he identifies himself with the humble villagers and implies his own intention of living in the minds of those who will live behind him after his death. These lines are replete with rare pathos as they suggest a man's last desire for living through others.
