What is Gray's attitude toward death in "Elegy Written in Country Churchyard".

Ans. In "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard", Death is the core theme. From the poem we come to know that Thomas Gray's attitude toward death at first is that everyone faces the same end, regardless of their social standing or sense of importance. With many of the lines of this poem, the author notes the positions in life that the living once held, and the activities that filled their days. He compares the powerful and humble. The mighty reach an end that is exactly the same as the lowly:
"The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power, And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave, Awaits alike the inevitable hour..."

Gray's "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard" is a reflection about death as the final domain of the human condition, regardless of wealth, position, or power. The first four stanzas present the images of twilight settling over a solitary figure in a small country churchyard. The first line, "The curfew tolls the knell of parting day," expresses the inevitable presence of death in three words: tolls, knell, and parting. Gray's use of the word "toll" recall this bell tolls may be so ill as that he knows not it tolls for him." Stanza 4 concludes the opening picture and leaves no doubt about the subject of the meditation: "Each in his narrow cell forever laid,/ The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep."
The next four stanzas continue the theme of death as the end of all individuals by listing the activities the dead used to do but do "no more." The repetition of "no more" (line 20) and "For them no more" (line 21remphasizes the fact that all human activity leads to the grave.

These two merge later in the poem, beginning in stanza 24, where, suddenly, the speaker imagines himself dead and buried, and the reader is invited to read his epitaph (line 115). In the face of inevitable doom, the speaker holds out the hope for immortality by making a friend of 'Heaven' and by believing that, dead, he rests in "The bosom of his Father and his God".

Thomas Gray warns those who are wealthy and powerful that whatever human beings possess or achieve in this world, their ultimate destination is the grave. The dead rustics of the village used
to lead a simple and ordinary life in comparison with the lives of the famous persons of their times. But, according to the poet, even such life is worth living because, on the final count, all men are equal. The pride in long and aristocratic ancestry, the show of power, and all the
advantages that wealth can give will be of no use. The poor and the rich, the powerful and the powerless are equal because all have to die. Death is a great equalizer or leveller. A man may win name and fame by means of extraordinary works but he is unable to avoid the clutches of death. All his achievement will be meaningless in the face of death.

In Conclusion, it can be said that it is predestined that we all have to die. Upper class people and lower class pcople: all will die. In fact, to God there is no discrimination. Therefore, rich must not be proud of their wealth and status; and ereryone should be ready for the ultimate destination.