To all that want, and all that wail,
Our pity shall be given,
And when this life of love shall fail,
We'll love again in heaven.
These couplets, with certain alterations in the first and last
lines, are to be found in the version printed in 'Poems for
Young Ladies', 1767, p. 98.
AN ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A MAD DOG.
This poem was first published in 'The Vicar of Wakefield', 1766, i.
175-6, where it is sung by one of the little boys. In common with the
'Elegy on Mrs. Mary Blaize' (p. 47) it owes something of its origin to
Goldsmith's antipathy to fashionable elegiacs, something also to the
story of M. de la Palisse. As regards mad dogs, its author seems to have
been more reasonable than many of his contemporaries, since he
ridiculed, with much common sense, their exaggerated fears on this
subject ('v. Chinese Letter' in 'The Public Ledger' for August 29, 1760,
afterwards Letter lxvi of 'The Citizen of the World', 1762, ii.
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