'Tis thine to curb the passions' madd'ning sway,
And wipe the mourner's bitter tear away;
'Tis thine to soothe when hope itself has fled,
And cheer with angel smile the sufferer's bed;
To give to earth its charm, to life its zest,
One only task, — to bless, and to be blest.
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Source, in full
John Graham, Granada: A Prize Poem (19 June 1833) collected in A Vision of Fair Spirits, and Other Poems (London and Oxford, 1834) p. 88. Misattributed to James Grahame in S. Austin Allibone (ed.) Poetical Quotations from Chaucer to Tennyson (Philadelphia: J. P. Lippincott & Co, 1875) p. 668 (under 'Woman')