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1. WordNet® 3.0 (2006)
thanatopsis
    n 1: an essay expressing a view on the subject of death

2. The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
thanatopsis \than`a*top"sis\ (th[a^]n`[.a]*t[o^]p"s[i^]s), n.
   [NL., fr. Gr. qa`natos death + 'o`psis view.]
   A view of death; a meditation on the subject of death.
   --Bryant.
   [1913 Webster]

3. The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48
Thanatopsis \Than`a*top"sis\ (th[a^]n`[.a]*t[o^]p"s[i^]s), prop.
   n. [NL., fr. Gr. qa`natos death + 'o`psis view.]
   The title of a poem by William Cullen Bryant (1794-1878),
   meditating on the subject of death. One of Bryant's
   best-remembered poems, it was written in 1811 and was
   discovered and rushed to publication in 1817 (in the North
   American Review) by Bryant's father, originally without the
   poet's knowledge. A revised version was published in 1821. In
   this elegy Bryant reflects that death comes to all men,
   common and great, and that all eventually shall rest together
   in the "mighty sepulchre" of the earth.
   [PJC]

   Note: The text of the poem is as follows:
         To him who in the love of nature holds
         Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
         A various language; for his gayer hours
         She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
         And eloquence of beauty; and she glides
         Into his darker musings, with a mild
         And healing sympathy that steals away
         Their sharpness ere he is aware. When thoughts
         Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
         Over thy spirit, and sad images
         Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
         And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,
         Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart; 
         Go forth, under the open sky, and list
         To Nature's teachings, while from all around 
         Earth and her waters, and the depths of air 
         Comes a still voice. Yet a few days, and thee
         The all-beholding sun shall see no more
         In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,
         Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,
         Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist
         Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim
         Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again,
         And, lost each human trace, surrendering up
         Thine individual being, shalt thou go
         To mix forever with the elements,
         To be a brother to the insensible rock
         And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain
         Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak
         Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mold.
         Yet not to thine eternal resting-place
         Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish
         Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
         With patriarchs of the infant world -- with kings,
         The powerful of the earth -- the wise, the good,
         Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,
         All in one mighty sepulchre. -- The hills
         Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun, -- the vales
         Stretching in pensive quietness between;
         The venerable woods -- rivers that move
         In majesty, and the complaining brooks
         That make the meadows green; and, poured round all,
         Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste,
         Are but the solemn decorations all
         Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun,
         The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,
         Are shining on the sad abodes of death
         Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
         The globe are but a handful to the tribes
         That slumber in its bosom. -- Take the wings
         Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness,
         Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
         Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound,
         Save his own dashings -- yet the dead are there:
         And millions in those solitudes, since first
         The flight of years began, have laid them down
         In their last sleep -- the dead reign there alone.
         So shalt thou rest -- and what if thou withdraw
         In silence from the living, and no friend
         Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
         Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
         When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care
         Plod on, and each one as before will chase
         His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave
         Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
         And make their bed with thee. As the long train
         Of ages glides away, the sons of men
         The youth in life's fresh spring, and he who goes
         In the full strength of years, matron and maid,
         The speechless babe, and the gray-headed man
         Shall one by one be gathered to thy side,
         By those, who in their turn, shall follow them.
         So live, that when thy summons comes to join
         The innumerable caravan, which moves
         To that mysterious realm, where each shall take
         His chamber in the silent halls of death,
         Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,
         Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed
         By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
         Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
         About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.
         [PJC]

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