Is that which plucks the regal crown Of Freedom from his forehead down, And snatches from his powerless hand The sceptred sign of self-command, Effacing with the chain and rod The image and the seal of God; Till from his nature, day by day, The manly virtues fall away,
And leave him naked, blind and mute, The godlike merging in the brute!
Why mourn the quiet ones who die Beneath affection's tender eye, Unto their household and their kin Like ripened corn-sheaves gathered in ? O weeper, from that tranquil sod, That holy harvest-home of God, Turn to the quick and suffering,-shed Thy tears upon the living dead!
Thank God above thy dear ones' graves, They sleep with Him,-they are not slaves
What dark mass, down the mountain-sides Swift-pouring, like a stream divides ?- A long, loose, straggling caravan, Camel and horse and arméd man. The moon's low crescent, glimmering o'er Its grave of waters to the shore, Lights up that mountain cavalcade, And glints from gun and spear and blade Near and more near !-now o'er them falls The shadow of the city walls.
Hark to the sentry's challenge, drowned In the fierce trumpet's charging sound!— The rush of men, the musket's peal, The short, sharp clang of meeting steel !
Vain, Moslem, vain thy lifeblood poured So freely on thy foeman's sword!
Not to the swift nor to the strong The battles of the right belong; For he who strikes for Freedom wears The armor of the captive's prayers, And Nature proffers to his cause The strength of her eternal laws; While he whose arm essays to bind And herd with common brutes his kind Strives evermore at fearful odds With Nature and the jealous gods, And dares the dread recoil which late Or soon their right shall vindicate.
"Tis done, the hornéd crescent falls! The star-flag flouts the broken walls! Joy to the captive husband! joy To thy sick heart, O brown-locked boy! In sullen wrath the conquered Moor Wide open flings your dungeon-door, And leaves ye free from cell and chain, The owners of yourselves again. Dark as his allies desert-born,
Soiled with the battle's stain, and worn With the long marches of his band Through hottest wastes of rock and sand,- Scorched by the sun and furnace-breath Of the red desert's wind of death, With welcome words and grasping hands, The victor and deliverer stands !
The tale is one of distant skies; The dust of half a century lies Upon it; yet its hero's name Still lingers on the lips of Fame. Men speak the praise of him who gave Deliverance to the Moorman's slave,
Yet dare to brand with shame and crime The heroes of our land and time,-
The self-forgetful ones, who stake
Home, name and life, for Freedom's sake God mend his heart who cannot feel The impulse of a holy zeal,
And sees not, with his sordid eyes, The beauty of self-sacrifice!
Though in the sacred place he stands Uplifting consecrated hands, Unworthy are his lips to tell Of Jesus' martyr-miracle,
Or name aright that dread embrace Of suffering for a fallen race!
"Jove means to settle
Astræa in her seat again,
And let down from his golden chain An age of better metal."
BEN JONSON, 1618
O, POET rare and old !
Thy words are prophecies ; Forward the age of gold, The new Saturnian lies.
The universal prayer
And hope are not in vain; Rise, brothers! and prepare The way for Saturn's reign.
Perish shall all which takes From labor's board and can; Perish shall all which makes A spaniel of the man!
Free from its bonds the mind, The body from the rod;
Broken all chains that bind The image of our God.
Just men no longer pine Behind their prison-bars; Through the rent dungeon shine The free sun and the stars.
Earth own, at last, untrod By sect, or caste, or clan, The fatherhood of God,
The brotherhood of man!
Fraud fail, craft perish, forth The money-changers driven, And God's will done on earth, As now in heaven!
THROUGH thy clear spaces, Lord, of old, Formless and void the dead earth rolled; Deaf to thy heaven's sweet music, blind To the great lights which o'er it shined; No sound, no ray, no warmth, no breath,- A dumb despair, a wandering death.
To that dark, weltering horror came Thy spirit, like a subtle flame,- A breath of life electrical, Awakening and transforming all, Till beat and thrilled in every part The pulses of a living heart.
Then knew their bounds the land and sea;
Then smiled the bloom of mead and tree;
From flower to moth, from beast to man, The quick creative impulse ran; And earth, with life from thee renewed, Was in thy holy eyesight good.
As lost and void, as dark and cold And formless as that earth of old,— A wandering waste of storm and night, Midst spheres of song and realms of light,— A blot upon thy holy sky,
Untouched, unwarned of thee, am I.
O thou who movest on the deep Of spirits, wake my own from sleep! Its darkness melt, its coldness warm, The lost restore, the ill transform, That flower and fruit henceforth may be Its grateful offering, worthy thee.
N THE DEATH OF RICHARD DILLINGHAM, IN THE NASHVILLE
"THE cross, if rightly borne, shall be No burden, but support to thee;”* So, moved of old time for our sake, The holy monk of Kempen spake.
Thou brave and true one ! upon Was laid the cross of martyrdom, How didst thou, in thy generous youth, Bear witness to this blessed truth!
Thy cross of suffering and of shame A staff within thy hands became,
* Thomas à Kempis. Imit Christ.
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