DEMOCRACY. O, ideal of my boyhood's time! The faith in which my father stood, Even when the sons of Lust and Crime' Had stained thy peaceful courts with blood! Still to those courts my footsteps turn, For, through the mists which darken there, I see the flame of Freedom burn, The Kebla of the patriot's prayer! Beneath thy broad, impartial eye, How fade the lines of caste and birth! How equal in their suffering lie The groaning multitudes of earth! Still to a stricken brother true, Whatever clime hath nurtured him; As stooped to heal the wounded Jew The worshipper of Gerizim. By misery unrepelled, unawed By pomp or power, thou see'st a MAN Through all disguise, form, place, or name, Through poverty and squalid shame, Thou lookest on the man within. On man, as man, retaining yet, Howe'er debased, and soiled, and dim, The crown upon his forehead set, The immortal gift of God to him. 59 And there is reverence in thy look; For that frail form which mortals wear And veiled his perfect brightness there. Not from the shallow babbling fount Thrilled, warmed, by turns, the listener's heart, In holy words which cannot die, In thoughts which angels leaned to know, Thy mission to a world of woe. That voice's echo hath not died! Thy name and watchword o'er this land Thy banded party worshippers. Not to these altars of a day, At party's call, my gift I bring; The voiceless utterance of his will, His pledge to Freedom and to Truth, Election Day, 1843. THY WILL BE DONE. 61 THY WILL BE DONE. E see not, know not; all our way The flesh may fail, the heart may faint, We take with solemn thankfulness Though dim as yet in tint and line, Thy will be done! And if, in our unworthiness, If from Thy ordeal's heated bars Our feet are seamed with crimson scars, If, for the age to come, this hour The hand-breadth cloud the sages feared The poison plant the fathers spared All else is overtopping. East, West, South, North, It curses the earth; All justice dies, Live only in its shadow. "EIN FESTE BURG IST UNSER GOTT." What gives the wheat-field blades of steel? What points the rebel cannon? Of the men o' the South? For the Union's life? - Then waste no blows on lesser foes Can ye not cry, "Let slavery die!" And union find in freedom? What though the cast-out spirit tear We who have shared the guilt must share Whate'er the loss, Whate'er the cross, Who trust in God's hereafter? For who that leans on His right arm What righteous cause can suffer harm Though wild and loud And dark the cloud, His hand upholds The calm sky of to-morrow! |