“The boast of heraldry, the pomp of pow’r, And all that beauty, all that wealth e’er gave Awaits alike the inevitable hour: The paths of glory lead but to the grave.”
These are one of the most famous lines of Thomas Gray, which explain the universal truth, “death conquers all.” Death is inevitable. Every person that arrives on this earth has to leave one day, irrespective of their status, power, position, race. These lines remind the reader of all the great conquerors of the world who fought for power but had to ultimately lead to nothing but grave.
“Here rests his head upon the lap of Earth
A youth to Fortune and Fame unknown.”
These are the opening lines of the epitaph that poet writes at the end the poem Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard. The poet writes this epitaph in the hope that someday when he would die, his body will lie in the same graveyard with that epitaph inscribed on his tombstone. These lines of epitaph indicate that in this grave is buried a young man who was neither famous nor achieved any financial success.
“From hence, ye Beauties, undeceiv'd,
Know one false step is ne'er retriev'd,
And be with caution bold.
Not all that tempts your wand'ring eyes
And heedless hearts, is lawful prize;
Nor all, that glisters, gold.”
These lines are from last stanza of the poem Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat by Thomas Gray. The poet wrote this set of verses to serve as an amusing poem with a moral when his friend’s cat Selima died while trying to catch hold of a gold fish swimming in a vase full of water. The cat was tempted to catch the fish just as a woman cannot resist temptation towards gold and diamonds. The poet warns that a single false step can lead to disastrous consequences; the women are warned by poet to not be deceived by appearances however beautiful something or someone appears. He concludes the poet by saying that not every metal that glitters is gold.
