ENGLAND! the time is come when thou shouldst wean
Thy heart from its emasculating food;
The truth should now be better understood;
Old things have been unsettled; we have seen
Fair seed-time, better harvest might have been
But for thy trespasses; and, at this day,
If for Greece, Egypt, India, Africa,
Aught good were destined, thou wouldst step between.
England! all nations in this charge agree:
But worse, more ignorant in love and hate
Far, far more abject is thine enemy:
Therefore the wise pray for thee, though the freight
Of thy offences be a heavy weight:
Oh grief! that earth's best hopes rest all with thee!
WHEN, looking on the present face of things,
I see one man, of men the meanest too!
Raised up to sway the world, to do, undo,
With mighty nations for his underlings,
The great events with which old story rings
Seem vain and hollow; I find nothing great;
Nothing is left which I can venerate;
So that almost a doubt within me springs
Of providence, such emptiness at length
Seems at the heart of all things. But, great God
I measure back the steps which I have trod;
And tremble, seeing, as I do, the strength
Of such poor instruments, with thoughts sublime
I tremble at the sorrow of the time.
TO THE MEN OF KENT, OCTOBER 1808.
VANGUARD of liberty, ye men of Kent,
Ye children of a soil that doth advance
Its haughty brow against the coast of France,
Now is the time to prove your hardiment!
To France be words of invitation sent!
They from their fields can see the countenance
Of your fierce war, may ken the glittering lanes,
And hear you shouting forth your brave intent.
Left single, in bold parley, ye, of yore,
Did from the Norman win a gallant wreath;
Confirmed the charters that were yours before ;-
No parleying now! In Britain is one breath;
We all are with you now from shore to shore :-
Yo men of Kent, 'tis victory or death!
ANTICIPATION, OCTOBER 1803
SHOUT, for a mighty victory is won!
On British ground the invaders are laid low;
The breath of Heaven has drifted them like snow,
And left them lying in the silent sun,
Never to rise again!-the work is done.
Come forth, ye old men, now in peaceful show
And greet your sons! drums beat and trumpets blow!
Make merry, wives! ye little children stun
Your Grandame's ears with pleasure of your
noise!
Clap, infants, clap your hands! divine must be
That triumph, when the very worst, the pain,
And even the prospect of our brethren slain,
Hath something in it which the heart enjoys:-
In glory will they sleep and endless sanctity.
ANOTHER year!-another deadly blow!
Another mighty empire overthrown!
And we are left, or shall be left, alone;
The last that dares to struggle with the foe.
"Tis well! from this day forward we shall know
That in ourselves our safety must be sought;
That by our own right hands it must be wrought,
That we must stand unpropped, or be laid low.
O dastard whom such foretaste doth not cheer!
We shall exult, if they who rule the land
Be men who hold its many blessings dear,
Wise, upright, valiant; not a venal band,
Who are to judge of danger which they fear,
And honour which they do not understand.
ON A CELEBRATED EVENT IN ANCIENT HISTORY.
A ROMAN master stands on Grecian ground,
And to the concourse of the Isthmian games
He, by his herald's voice, aloud proclaims
THE LIBERTY OF GREECE:-the words rebound
Until all voices in one voice are drowned;
Glad acclamation by which air was rent!
And birds, high flying in the element,
Dropped to the earth, astonished at the sound!
-A melancholy echo of that noise
Doth sometimes hang on musing Fancy's ear:
Ah! that a conqueror's words should be so dear;
Ah! that a boon could shed such rapturous joys!
A gift of that which is not to be given
By all the blended powers of earth and Heaven.
WHEN, far and wide, swift as the beams of morn
The tidings passed of servitude repealed,
And of that joy which shook the Isthmian Field,
The rough Etolians smiled with bitter scorn.
""Tis known," cried they, "that He, who would adorn
His envied temples with the Isthmian crown,
Must either win, through effort of his own,
The prize, or be content to see it worn
By more deserving brows.-Yet so ye prop,
Sons of the brave who fought at Marathon,
Your feeble spirits. Greece her head hath bowed,
As if the wreath of liberty thereon
Would fix itself as smoothly as a cloud,
Which, at Jove's will, descends on Pelion's top!"
TO THOMAS CLARKSON, ON THE FINAL PASSING OF THE BILL FOR THE
ABOLITION OF THE SLAVE TRADE, MARCH 1807.
CLARKSON! it was an obstinate hill to climb :-
How toilsome, nay how dire it was, by thee
Is known, by none, perhaps, so feelingly;
But thou, who, starting in thy fervent prime,
Didst first lead forth this pilgrimage sublime,
Hast heard the constant voice its charge repeat,
Which, out of thy young heart's oracular seat,
First roused thee.-O true yoke-fellow of time
With unabating effort, see, the palm
Is won, and by all nations shall be worn!
The bloody writing is for ever torn,
And thou henceforth shalt have a good man's calm,
A great man's happiness; thy zeal shall find
Repose at length, firm friend of human kind!
A PROPHECY, FEBRUARY 1807.
HIGH deeds, O Germans, are to come from you!
Thus in your books the record shall be found,
"A watchword was pronounced, a potent sound,
ARMINIUS!-all the people quaked like dew
Stirred by the breeze-they rose, a nation, true,
True to itself the mighty Germany,
She of the Danube and the Northern Sea,
She rose, and off at once the yoke she threw.
All power was given her in the dreadful trance-
Those new-born kings she withered like a flame."
-Woe to them all! but heaviest woe and shame
To that Bavarian who did first advance
His banner in accursed league with France,
First open traitor to a sacred name!
COKIOSED WHILE THE AUTHOR WAS ENGAGED IN WRITING A TRACT
OCCASIONED BY THE CONVENTION OF CINTRA, 1808.
NOT 'mid the world's vain objects that enslave
The free-born soul,-that world whose vaunted skill
In selfish interest perverts the will,
Whose factions lead astray the wise and brave;
Not there! but in dark wood and rocky cave,
And hollow vale which foaming torrents fill
With omnipresent murmur as they rave
Down their steep beds that never shall be still:
Here, mighty Nature!-in this school sublime
I weigh the hopes and fears of suffering Spain:
For her consult the auguries of time,
And through the human heart explore my way,
And look and listen,-gathering where I may,
Triumph, and thoughts no bondage can restrain.
COMPOSED AT THE SAME TIME AND ON THE SAME OCCASION.
I DROPPED my pen;-and listened to the wind
That sang of trees up-torn and vessels tost;
-A midnight harmony, and wholly lost
To the general sense of men by chains confined
Of business, care, or pleasure,-or resigned
To timely sleep.-Thought I, the impassioned strain,
Which, without aid of numbers, I sustain,
Like acceptation from the world will find.
Yet some with apprehensive ear shall drink
A dirge devoutly breathed o'er sorrows past,
And to the attendant promise will give heed,
The prophecy,-like that of this wild blast,
Which, while it makes the heart with sadness shrink
Tells also of bright calms that shall succeed.
OF mortal parents is the hero born
By whom the undaunted Tyrolese are led?
Or is it Tell's great spirit, from the dead
Returned to animate an age forlorn?
He comes like Phoebus through the gates of morn
When dreary darkness is discomfited:
Yet mark his modest state!-upon his head,
That simple crest-a heron's plume-is worn
O Liberty! they stagger at the shock;
The murderers are aghast; they strive to flee
And half their host is buried :-rock on rock
Descends :-beneath this godlike warrior, see.
Hills, torrents, woods, embodied to bemook
The Tyrant, and confound his cruelty.
ADVANCE-Come forth from thy Tyrolean ground
Dear Liberty!-stern nymph of soul untamed,
Sweet nymph, Oh! rightly of the mountains named!
Through the long chain of Alps from mound to mound
And o'er the eternal snows, like Echo, bound,—
Like Echo, when the hunter-train at dawn
Have roused her from her sleep and forest lawn,
Cliffs, woods, and caves her viewless steps resound
And babble of her pastime !-On, dread power,
With such invisible motion speed thy flight,
Through hanging clouds, from craggy height to height
Through the green vales and through the herdsman's
That all the Alps may gladden in thy might,
Here, there, and in all places at one hour.
FEELINGS OF THE TYROLESE.
THE land we from our fathers had in trust,
And to our children will transmit, or die:
This is our maxim, this our piety;
And God and Nature say that it is just.
That which we would perform in arms-we must!
We read the dictate in the infant's eye;
In the wife sinile; and in the placid sky;
And, at our feet, amid the silent dust
Of them that were before us.-Sing aloud
Old songs, the precious music of the heart!
Give, herds and flocks! your voices to the wind!
While we go forth, a self-devoted crowd,
With weapons in the fearless hand, to assert
Our virtue, and to vindicate mankind.
ALAS! what boots the long, laborious quest
Of moral prudence, sought through good and ill,
Or pains abstruse, to elevate the will,
And lead us on to that transcendant rest
Where every passion shall the sway attest
Of Reason seated on her sovereign hill;-
What is it but a vain and curious skill,
If sapient Germany must lie deprest,
Beneath the brutal sword?-Her haughty schools
Shall blush; and may not we with sorrow say,
A few strong instincts and a few plain rules,
Among the herdsmen of the Alps, have wrought
More for mankind at this unhappy day
Than all the pride of intellect and thought.
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