Vanitas Vanitatum Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCB DEFG HIJI AKCK BGBE FBFB LMKM FBDB KNLN LMLM OPOQ RSRP TPPP UVUB WBWB XLXL| How spake of old the Royal Seer | A |
| His text is one I love to treat on | B |
| This life of ours he said is sheer | C |
| Mataiotes Mataioteton | B |
| - | |
| O Student of this gilded Book | D |
| Declare while musing on its pages | E |
| If truer words were ever spoke | F |
| By ancient or by modern sages | G |
| - | |
| The various authors' names but note | H |
| French Spanish English Russians Germans | I |
| And in the volume polyglot | J |
| Sure you may read a hundred sermons | I |
| - | |
| What histories of life are here | A |
| More wild than all romancers' stories | K |
| What wondrous transformations queer | C |
| What homilies on human glories | K |
| - | |
| What theme for sorrow or for scorn | B |
| What chronicle of Fate's surprises | G |
| Of adverse fortune nobly borne | B |
| Of chances changes ruins rises | E |
| - | |
| Of thrones upset and sceptres broke | F |
| How strange a record here is written | B |
| Of honors dealt as if in joke | F |
| Of brave desert unkindly smitten | B |
| - | |
| How low men were and how they rise | L |
| How high they were and how they tumble | M |
| O vanity of vanities | K |
| O laughable pathetic jumble | M |
| - | |
| Here between honest Janin's joke | F |
| And his Turk Excellency's firman | B |
| I write my name upon the book | D |
| I write my name and end my sermon | B |
| - | |
| - | |
| - | |
| O Vanity of vanities | K |
| How wayward the decrees of Fate are | N |
| How very weak the very wise | L |
| How very small the very great are | N |
| - | |
| What mean these stale moralities | L |
| Sir Preacher from your desk you mumble | M |
| Why rail against the great and wise | L |
| And tire us with your ceaseless grumble | M |
| - | |
| Pray choose us out another text | O |
| O man morose and narrow minded | P |
| Come turn the page I read the next | O |
| And then the next and still I find it | Q |
| - | |
| Read here how Wealth aside was thrust | R |
| And Folly set in place exalted | S |
| How Princes footed in the dust | R |
| While lackeys in the saddle vaulted | P |
| - | |
| Though thrice a thousand years are past | T |
| Since David's son the sad and splendid | P |
| The weary King Ecclesiast | P |
| Upon his awful tablets penned it | P |
| - | |
| Methinks the text is never stale | U |
| And life is every day renewing | V |
| Fresh comments on the old old tale | U |
| Of Folly Fortune Glory Ruin | B |
| - | |
| Hark to the Preacher preaching still | W |
| He lifts his voice and cries his sermon | B |
| Here at St Peter's of Cornhill | W |
| As yonder on the Mount of Hermon | B |
| - | |
| For you and me to heart to take | X |
| O dear beloved brother readers | L |
| To day as when the good King spake | X |
| Beneath the solemn Syrian cedars | L |
William Makepeace Thackeray
(1)
Poem topics: , Print This Poem , Rhyme Scheme
Submit Spanish Translation
Submit German Translation
Submit French Translation
About Vanitas Vanitatum
Vanitas Vanitatum is a poem by William Makepeace Thackeray. This page includes the poem text, poet information, related topics, comments, and similar poems.
Write your comment about Vanitas Vanitatum poem by William Makepeace Thackeray
Best Poems of William Makepeace Thackeray