defined
- Worms’-Meat
- n. The finished product of which we are the raw material. The contents of the Taj Mahal, the Tombeau Napoleon and the Granitarium. Worms’-meat is usually outlasted by the structure that houses it, but “this too must pass away.” Probably the silliest work in which a human being can engage is construction of a tomb for himself. The solemn purpose cannot dignify, but only accentuates by contrast the foreknown futility.
- Ambitious fool! so mad to be a show! How profitless the labor you bestow Upon a dwelling whose magnificence The tenant neither can admire nor know.
- Build deep, build high, build massive as you can, The wanton grass-roots will defeat the plan By shouldering asunder all the stones In what to you would be a moment’s span.
- Time to the dead so all unreckoned flies That when your marble is all dust, arise, If wakened, stretch your limbs and yawn — You’ll think you scarcely can have closed your eyes.
- What though of all man’s works your tomb alone Should stand till Time himself be overthrown? Would it advantage you to dwell therein Forever as a stain upon a stone?
- Joel Huck