<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=37127" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>The Roman Sentinel</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">Death or dishonor, which is best to taste?<br> A Roman sentinel in Pompeii,<br>When God’s hot anger laid that city waste,<br> Answered the question, and resolved to die.<br>His duty was, upon his post to bide<br>Till the relief came, let what might betide.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">He stood forgotten by the fleeing guard,<br> Choosing that part which is the bitterest still,<br>His face with its fixed purpose cold and hard,<br> Cut in the resolute granite of his will.<br>“Better,” he said “to die, than live in shame;<br>Death wreathes fresh flowers round a brave man’s name.”</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Life is the wave’s deep whisper on the shore,<br> Of a great sea beyond. The sentry saw<br>That day the light in broad sails hoisted o’er<br> The drifting boat of dawn; nor dreamed the flaw,<br>The puff called death, would blow him with them by<br>Out to the boundless sea beyond the sky.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The sentry watched the mountain’s fire-gashed cheeks,<br> And saw come up the sand’s entombing shower.<br>The storm darts out its red tongue when it speaks,<br> And fierce Vesuvius, in that wild hour,<br>Put forth its tongue of flame, and spoke the word<br>Of hatred to the city from the Lord.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The gloom of seventeen centuries skulked away,<br> And standing in a marble niche was found<br>A skeleton in armor all decay;<br> The soulless skull was by a helmet crowned,<br>Cleaving thereon with mingled rust and sand,<br>And a long spear was in the crumbling hand.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">In Pompeii are beasts of stone with wings,<br> Paved streets with marble temples on each side,<br>Baths, houses, paintings, monuments of kings;<br> But the arched gate whereat the sentry died,<br>The rusted spear, and helmet with no crest,<br>Are better far to see than all the rest.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">O heart, whatever lot to thee God gives,<br> Be strong, and swerve not from a blameless way;<br>Dishonor hurts the soul that ever lives,<br> Death hurts the body that is kin with clay.<br>Though Duty’s face is stern, her path is best:<br>They sweetly sleep who die upon her breast.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Henry+Abbey">Henry Abbey</a><div class=q> <img src="https://www.citatepedia.ro/g/32share.png" style="float:left" alt="Share"> <script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=37127" data-title="The Roman Sentinel de Henry Abbey" data-description="Death or dishonor, which is best to taste?/ A Roman sentinel in Pompeii,/When God’s hot anger laid that city waste,/ Answered the question, and resolved to die./His duty was, upon his post to bide/Till the relief came, let what might betide./He ..."></div> </div> </div>

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