This is my month for coming across the original of things I only knew in parody. I knew they were parodies, but it's a bit of a shock to see the original referenced in a newspaper or book.
Actual: Lives of great men all remind us/we can make our lives sublime,/and, departing, leave behind us/footprints on the sands of time --Longfellow
What I knew: Lives of great men all remind us/as we o'er their pages turn,/that, each one, we leave behind us/letters that we ought to burn.
Actual: Breathes there a man with soul so dead/who never to himself hath said/ "This is my own, my native land...".Scott
What I knew: Breathes there a man with soul so dead/who never to himself hath said/ "I shoulda stood in bed".
Next thing I'll be reading "How doth the little busy bee..."