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Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard

By Thomas Gray (1716-1771) at the age of 54

Bio of the Poem

Thomas Gray was an English poet, letter-writer, classical scholar, Historian and professor at
Pembroke College, Cambridge. He is widely known for his Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard,
published in 1751. Gray was a self-critical writer who published only 13 poems in his lifetime, despite
being very popular.

Publication, Form, Tone, Structure, Style, Rhyme scheme, Meter of the Poem.

• Thomas Gray’s “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” belongs to the genre of elegy. An
elegy is a poem written to mourn a person’s death. Gray wrote this elegy in the year 1742. However,
he published it only in the year 1751. He wrote this poem after the death of his friend Richard West.

• “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” is written in heroic quatrains.

• A quatrain is a four-line stanza. This poem consists of 33 stanzas.

• Heroic quatrains rhyme in an abab pattern and are written in iambic pentameter.

• An iamb is a poetic foot consisting of one unstressed and one stressed syllable, as in the
phrase “the world.” Pentameter simply means that there are five feet in each line.

• The rhyming scheme is abab, cdcd, efef, …

• The tone of the poem "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard by Thomas Gray" is sad and
somber. The mood on the other hand is the overall feeling of a poem and is created by the tone of
the poem. The mood in this poem is sorrowful and solemn. The tone of the poem is sad and somber.

• There is a pastoral setting; however, there are no pastoral characters. The poem ends in the
poet’s own epitaph.

• An epitaph is a short text honoring a deceased person. Strictly speaking, it refers to text that
is inscribed on a tombstone or plaque, but it may also be used in a figurative sense. Some epitaphs
are specified by the person themselves before their death, while others are chosen by those
responsible for the burial.

Central Idea and Themes of the poem

The main themes in "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard" are the universality of death, social
class and value, and poetry and posterity. The universality of death: Gray's poem depicts death as a
leveling force that brings all people, whether rich or poor, to the same final fate

• Death.
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• Memory and the Past.

• Man and the Natural World.

• Society and Class.

• Isolation.

• The universality of death: Gray's poem depicts death as a leveling force that brings all
people, whether rich or poor, to the same final fate.

• Social class and value: The poem argues against the notion that the poor are less worthy
than the rich. Indeed, Gray suggests that all deserve to be remembered.

• Poetry and posterity: Gray's speaker is a poet, and as he memorializes others in his
melancholic mode, he is aware of his own finitude.

Poem Summary and Critical Analysis

Lines 1-4

In the first stanza, the speaker observes the signs of a country day drawing to a close: a curfew bell
ringing, a herd of cattle moving across the pasture, and a farm laborer returning home. The speaker
is then left alone to contemplate the isolated rural scene. The first line of the poem sets a distinctly
somber tone: the curfew bell does not simply ring; it “knells”—a term usually applied to bells rung at
a death or funeral. From the start, then, Gray reminds us of human mortality.

Lines 5-8

The second stanza sustains the somber tone of the first: the speaker is not mournful, but pensive, as
he describes the peaceful landscape that surrounds him. Even the air is characterized as having a
“solemn stillness.”

Lines 9-12

The sound of an owl hooting intrudes upon the evening quiet. We are told that the owl “complains”;
in this context, the word does not mean “to whine” or “grumble,” but “to express sorrow.” The owl’s
call, then, is suggestive of grief. Note that at no point in these three opening stanzas does Gray
directly refer to death or a funeral; rather, he indirectly creates a funereal atmosphere by describing
just a few mournful sounds.

Lines 13-16

It is in the fourth stanza that the speaker directly draws our attention to the graves in the country
churchyard. We are presented with two potentially conflicting images of death. Line 14 describes the
heaps of earth surrounding the graves; in order to dig a grave, the earth must necessarily be
disrupted. Note that the syntax of this line is slightly confusing. We would expect this sentence to
read “Where the turf heaves”—not “where heaves the turf”: Gray has inverted the word order. Just
as the earth has been disrupted, the syntax imitates the way in which the earth has been disrupted.
But by the same token, the “rude Forefathers” buried beneath the earth seem entirely at peace: we
are told that they are laid in “cells,” a term which reminds us of the quiet of a monastery, and that
they “sleep.”
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Lines 17-20

If the “Forefathers” are sleeping, however, the speaker reminds us that they will never again rise
from their “beds” to hear the pleasurable sounds of country life that the living do. The term “lowly
beds” describes not only the unpretentious graves in which the forefathers are buried, but the
humble conditions that they endured when they were alive.

Lines 21-24

The speaker then moves on to consider some of the other pleasures the dead will no longer enjoy:
the happiness of home, wife, and children.

Lines 25-28

The dead will also no longer be able to enjoy the pleasures of work, of plowing the fields each day.
This stanza points to the way in which the “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” contains
elements of both Augustan and Romantic poetry. Poetry that describes agriculture—as this one does
—is called georgic. Georgic verse was extremely popular in the eighteenth century. Note, however,
that Gray closely identifies the farmers with the land that they work. This association of man and
nature is suggestive of a romantic attitude. The georgic elements of the stanza almost demand that
we characterize it as typical of the eighteenth century, but its tone looks forward to the Romantic
period.

Lines 29-32

The next four stanzas caution those who are wealthy and powerful not to look down on the poor.
These lines warn the reader not to slight the “obscure” “destiny” of the poor—the fact that they will
never be famous or have long histories, or “annals,” written about them.

Lines 33-36

This stanza invokes the idea of memento mori (literally, a reminder of mortality). The speaker
reminds the reader that regardless of social position, beauty, or wealth, all must eventually die.

Lines 37-40

The speaker also challenges the reader not to look down on the poor for having modest, simple
graves. He suggests, moreover, that the elaborate memorials that adorn the graves of the “Proud”
are somehow excessive. In this context, the word “fretted” in line 39 has a double meaning: on the
one hand, it can refer to the design on a cathedral ceiling; on the other hand, it can suggest that
there is something “fretful,” or troublesome, about the extravagant memorials of the wealthy.

Lines 41-44

The speaker observes that nothing can bring the dead back to life, and that all the advantages that
the wealthy had in life are useless in the face of death. Neither elaborate funeral monuments nor
impressive honors can restore life. Nor can flattery in some way be used to change the mind of
death. Note here Gray’s use of personification in characterizing both “flattery” and “death”—as
though death has a will or mind of its own.

Lines 45-48
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The speaker then reconsiders the poor people buried in the churchyard. He wonders what great
deeds they might have accomplished had they been given the opportunity: one of these poor
farmers, the speaker reasons, might have been a great emperor; another might have “waked … the
living lyre,” or been a great poet or musician.

Lines 49-52

The poor were never able to fulfill their political and artistic potential, however, because they were
uneducated—they never received the “Knowledge” that would enable them to rule and to create.
Instead, “Penury,” or poverty, “froze the genial current of their soul.” That is, poverty paralyzed their
ability to draw upon their innermost passions—the very passions that could have inspired them to
become great poets or politicians.

Lines 53-56

In a series of analogies, Gray observes that the talents of the poor are like a “gem” hidden in the
ocean or a “flower” blooming in the desert. Just as an unseen flower in the desert is a “waste,” Gray
suggests, the uneducated talents of the poor are also a “waste,” because they remain unused and
undeveloped.

Lines 57-60

The speaker then compares these poor, uneducated people to three of the most famous and
powerful people of the previous century: John Hampden, a parliamentary leader who defended the
people against the abuses of Charles I; John Milton, the great poet who wrote Paradise Lost and who
also opposed Charles I; and Oliver Cromwell, Lord Protector of England from 1653 to 1658. The
speaker suggests that buried in this churchyard might be someone who—like Hampden, Milton, or
Cromwell—had the innate ability to oppose tyranny, but never had the opportunity to exercise that
ability.

Lines 61-64

This person, the speaker reasons, with the proper education and resources, might have
“commanded” the government as well as any great political leader. Note, however, that Gray gives
us two ways in which to consider this power. On the one hand, a great ruler can receive applause
and can ignore “threats of pain and ruin.” A great leader can “scatter plenty,” can offer prosperity, to
a grateful nation. But on the other hand, if one governs, one is, in fact, exposed to dangerous
threats. And simply governing to receive “applause” suggests a shallow and self-serving motive.
Moreover, “scattering plenty” implies that the wealth of a nation can be squandered by its rulers.
Gray may be suggesting that having power is not as desirable as it seems. Note that the final line of
this stanza is enjambed; it continues into the following line—and in this case, the next stanza.

Lines 65-68

The first line of this stanza continues the thought of the previous, enjambed line. It abruptly reminds
us that the impoverished conditions of the poor “forbade” them from becoming great rulers. Gray
underscores the abrupt shock of this idea by abruptly interrupting the flow of the line with a
caesura. Building on the idea of the previous stanza, the speaker notes that if poverty prevented the
country laborers from acquiring the “virtues” of great and powerful people, it also prevented them
from committing the “crimes” often associated with those people—and especially with those people
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who hold political power. In particular, it prevented them from engaging in the bloody activity
associated with the British Civil War.

Lines 69-72

Because these farm laborers were not in positions of power, the speaker reasons, they never had to
ignore their own consciences. Nor did they sacrifice their artistic talents (the gift of the “Muse”) to
“Luxury” or “Pride.”

Lines 73-76

The speaker continues his praise of the simple life of common people. They are “far from the
madding crowd” of city and political life. “Madding” here can mean either “maddening” (that is, the
source of madness or insanity) or it can mean “mad” (that is, the crowd is itself hatefully insane). In
either case, the common country people were removed from this insane world; as a result, they
never “strayed” into the immoral acts of the powerful. Instead, they kept steadily to their simple but
meaningful lives.

Lines 77-80

The speaker then reminds us that these common people are, in fact, long dead. He notes that even if
they were not powerful or great, and even if they do not have an elaborate memorial of the sort
mentioned in line 38, they still deserve homage or tribute. At the very least, he suggests, an
onlooker should “sigh” on seeing their graves. Note here the multiple meanings we can attach to the
word “passing.” It can refer to the onlooker, who is simply walking or “passing by” these graves. It
can mean “in passing”—that someone seeing these graves should take just a moment out of their
busy lives to remember the dead. And “passing” itself is a euphemism for death. In a way, then, Gray
is suggesting that there is no difference between the person “passing” by the grave and the person
who has “passed” away—another reminder that all will eventually die.

Lines 81-84

Instead of “fame and elegy,” the people buried here have modest tombstones, which display only
their names and the dates of their birth and death. These common people were not famous, and no
one has written elaborate elegies or funeral verses for them. Still, the very modesty of their tomb-
stones testifies to the nobility and “holy” nature of their simple lives. As such, they provide an
example not so much of how life should be lived, but how its end, death, should be approached. The
term “rustic moralist” here is open to interpretation. It may refer to anyone who is in the
countryside thinking about the meaning of death. But more likely, it refers to the speaker, who is
himself moralizing—preaching or contemplating—about the nature of both life and death.

Lines 85-88

The speaker reasons that most people, faced with the prospect of dying and ultimately being
forgotten, cling to life. Note Gray’s use of paradox in line 86: “this pleasing anxious being.” On the
one hand, “being” or living can be “anxious,” filled with worries. On the other hand, just being alive
— when faced with death—is itself “pleasing” or pleasant. The speaker is suggesting that even the
troubles and worries of life are enjoyable in comparison to death.

Lines 89-92
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The dead rely on the living to remember them and to mourn for them. The speaker suggests that
this need is so fundamental that even from the grave the buried dead seem to ask for remembrance.
In fact, as line 92 suggests, the dead actually live on in our memories.

Lines 93-96

In this stanza, the speaker addresses himself. He reasons that since he himself has been mindful of
the dead, and has remembered and praised them in this poem, perhaps when he is dead someone
will remember him. This person, he reasons, will necessarily be a “kindred Spirit,” someone who is
also a lonely wanderer in the country, meditating on the nature of death. The speaker then goes on
to imagine his own death: he envisions this “kindred Spirit” seeing his (the speaker’s) grave and
wondering about his life and death.

Lines 97-100

In the next five stanzas, the speaker imagines how an old farm laborer might remember him after his
death. If, the speaker speculates, the “kindred Spirit” sees the speaker’s grave and wonders about it,
perhaps an old man might offer to describe the speaker. The old man would say that the speaker
was often seen wandering about the countryside at dawn. Presumably, he was frequently out all
night—as, no doubt, he has been in this very poem.

Lines 101-104

At noon, the old man continues, the speaker would frequently stretch out under an old tree at noon,
and stare at a nearby brook.

Lines 105-108

The old man would have observed that the speaker’s moods were changeable: sometimes the
speaker would wander about in the nearby woods, “smiling scornfully” and talking to himself; other
times, he would appear depressed; then again, sometimes he would look as though he were in
anguish. Perhaps, the old man speculates, the speaker had been “crossed in hopeless love.”

Lines 109-112

The speaker continues to imagine this old man remembering him after his death. The old man would
have noticed one morning that the speaker was absent: he was not in any of his favorite spots.
Likewise, the old man would remember, the speaker did not appear the following day.

Lines 113-116

The third day, however, the old man and his friends would have seen the speaker’s body being
carried to the churchyard for burial. (The speaker, then, is imagining himself buried in the very
graveyard he once used to wander by.) The old man invites this curious passerby, or “kindred Spirit,”
to read the speaker’s epitaph. Note the reminder that the old man is uneducated: he cannot read,
although the passerby can do so.

Lines 117-120

The last three stanzas are, in fact, the speaker’s epitaph; the way in which the speaker imagines his
epitaph will read. Through the epitaph, the speaker asks the passerby (and the reader) not to
remember him as wealthy, famous, or brilliantly educated, but as one who was “melancholic” or
deeply thoughtful and sad.
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Lines 121-124

The speaker asks that we remember him for being generous and sincere. His generosity was, in fact,
his willingness to mourn for the dead. Because he was so generous, the speaker reasons, heaven
gave him a “friend”—someone who would, in turn, mourn for him after his death. This friend is
unnamed, but we can deduce that it is any “kindred Spirit”—including the reader—who reads the
speaker’s epitaph and remembers him.

Lines 125-128

The speaker concludes by cautioning the reader not to praise him any further. He also asks that his
“frailties,” his flaws or personal weaknesses, not be considered; rather, they should be left to the
care of God, with whom the speaker now resides. The poem, then, is an elegy not only for the
common man, but for the speaker himself. Indeed, by the end of the poem it is evident that the
speaker himself wishes to be identified not with the great and famous, but with the common people
whom he has praised and with whom he will, presumably, be buried.

Text of The Poem

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,

The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea,

The plowman homeward plods his weary way,

And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

Now fades the glimm'ring landscape on the sight,

And all the air a solemn stillness holds,

Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,

And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;

Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow'r

The moping owl does to the moon complain

Of such, as wand'ring near her secret bow'r,

Molest her ancient solitary reign.

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Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,

Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap,

Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,

The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

The breezy call of incense-breathing Morn,

The swallow twitt'ring from the straw-built shed,

The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn,

No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.

For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,

Or busy housewife ply her evening care:

No children run to lisp their sire's return,

Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.

Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,

Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke;

How jocund did they drive their team afield!

How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!

Let not Ambition mock their useful toil,

Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;

Nor Grandeur hear with a disdainful smile

The short and simple annals of the poor.

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of pow'r,

And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,

Awaits alike th' inevitable hour.

The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

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Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault,

If Mem'ry o'er their tomb no trophies raise,

Where thro' the long-drawn aisle and fretted vault

The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.

Can storied urn or animated bust

Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath?

Can Honour's voice provoke the silent dust,

Or Flatt'ry soothe the dull cold ear of Death?

Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid

Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire;

Hands, that the rod of empire might have sway'd,

Or wak'd to ecstasy the living lyre.

But Knowledge to their eyes her ample page

Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll;

Chill Penury repress'd their noble rage,

And froze the genial current of the soul.

Full many a gem of purest ray serene,

The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear:

Full many a flow'r is born to blush unseen,

And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Some village-Hampden, that with dauntless breast

The little tyrant of his fields withstood;

Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,

Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood.

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Th' applause of list'ning senates to command,

The threats of pain and ruin to despise,

To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,

And read their hist'ry in a nation's eyes,

Their lot forbade: nor circumscrib'd alone

Their growing virtues, but their crimes confin'd;

Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne,

And shut the gates of mercy on mankind,

The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,

To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,

Or heap the shrine of Luxury and Pride

With incense kindled at the Muse's flame.

Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife,

Their sober wishes never learn'd to stray;

Along the cool sequester'd vale of life

They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.

Yet ev'n these bones from insult to protect,

Some frail memorial still erected nigh,

With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture deck'd,

Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.

Their name, their years, spelt by th' unletter'd muse,

The place of fame and elegy supply:

And many a holy text around she strews,

That teach the rustic moralist to die.

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For who to dumb Forgetfulness a prey,

This pleasing anxious being e'er resign'd,

Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,

Nor cast one longing, ling'ring look behind?

On some fond breast the parting soul relies,

Some pious drops the closing eye requires;

Ev'n from the tomb the voice of Nature cries,

Ev'n in our ashes live their wonted fires.

For thee, who mindful of th' unhonour'd Dead

Dost in these lines their artless tale relate;

If chance, by lonely contemplation led,

Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate,

Haply some hoary-headed swain may say,

"Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn

Brushing with hasty steps the dews away

To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.

"There at the foot of yonder nodding beech

That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high,

His listless length at noontide would he stretch,

And pore upon the brook that babbles by.

"Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn,

Mutt'ring his wayward fancies he would rove,

Now drooping, woeful wan, like one forlorn,

Or craz'd with care, or cross'd in hopeless love.

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"One morn I miss'd him on the custom'd hill,

Along the heath and near his fav'rite tree;

Another came; nor yet beside the rill,

Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he;

"The next with dirges due in sad array

Slow thro' the church-way path we saw him borne.

Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay,

Grav'd on the stone beneath yon aged thorn."

THE EPITAPH

Here rests his head upon the lap of Earth

A youth to Fortune and to Fame unknown.

Fair Science frown'd not on his humble birth,

And Melancholy mark'd him for her own.

Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere,

Heav'n did a recompense as largely send:

He gave to Mis'ry all he had, a tear,

He gain'd from Heav'n ('twas all he wish'd) a friend.

No farther seek his merits to disclose,

Or draw his frailties from their dread abode,

(There they alike in trembling hope repose)

The bosom of his Father and his God.