THE CEMETERY

In the burning zeal with which my heart is seized,
And what zeal ever appeared more legitimate!
In spirit, near me, I picture the victim;
I take him, prepare him, and place him on the altar;
My hand sprinkles him with oil, and covers him with salt;
My desires and my tears serve as my lustral water water used for ceremonial purification,
And soon from my breast, a long sigh exhales:
"God of love and peace, who in man has sown
The seeds of your glory, and who formed him
Only to cultivate them; by you, I conjure you
To grant my vows, if the victim is pure.
These dead who are here, who, of their sad days,
Under the eye of your justice, have completed the course,
Could they not serve the plans of your tenderness!
To heal your children, oh! profound wisdom,
Is not everything in the rank of your powerful means!
Arise, dead ones, oh! you, my true fellow citizens;
God permits it, leave the abode of life;
See again for an instant your human fatherland,
Your friends, your parents; let everyone, in these districts,
Through you, learn the lessons of wisdom!
The sepulcher, in opening to their fragile remains,
One day, will swallow up their fatal passions.
They will see sleeping there, near the assassin,
Those whose breast his fury will have pierced;
The starving pauper beside the miser
Who will have rejected him in his barbaric disdain;
Beside the ingrate his zealous benefactor,
And the innocent beside his persecutor.
Come and expose these prophetic pictures to them;
Present these peaceful lessons to the living,
And may they all, from this world onward, be so many friends."