That state of comfort suited to its kind. It, to no fellow brute, deep rev’rence yields, Who wastes the produce of an hundred fields; Content to follow shiv’ring in his train, The loyal victim of a tyrant’s reign: Nor, leagued with others, to provide a feast, Brings slaughter’d herds to gorge some kingly beast; Seeking no further bounty than to taste, For all this toil, a morsel of the waste: Then, weary, crouch and lick his wounds, o’erjoy’d That a kind monarch has _his_ strength employ’d, To cater for the royal appetite, And kept his sacred person from the fight. Ask of the Beaver, Slave! what wholesome rules Binds his community,--unknown to schools: Inquire the rights he claims,--the law he gives, In that society in which he lives? He will instruct thee, ’tis for mutual good, To share defence, and fellowship and food:-- That gen’ral benefit cements the tie, Which binds his species in society. Ask if he rears for some proud beast, a pile, Secure and warm, and skulks himself, the while Into a den, expos’d to pinching cold, To damp and hunger, on the bare earth roll’d? Content and cheerful so _that_ worthless beast, Which hunts not,--toils not, may profusely feast? And learn, thy crimes, thy follies, fears, alone Of all earth’s varied beings, make thee own A tyrant in thy equal;--whose control O’erawes thy pow’rs, and fetters e’en thy soul. The brute, content with what kind nature gives, Guards his own rights, and thus, in freedom lives. Or, if too weak for once, to guard the spoil, He bars no right, nor lends himself to toil Or hunt, that others may doze out the day, And wake to riot on his proffer’d prey. But myriad slaves of human kind, are found To toil and sweat,--to cultivate the ground, To spin, to weave, to mine, ’midst fœtid air And noxious damps,--to spend their lives with care And grief oppress’d,--by penury bow’d down, That some vile mortal’s brows may wear a crown. Yes! nations faint beneath this dead’ning blight!-- This mildew of oppression! in despite Of nature’s promptings, or of reason’s call, Bound by the spells of superstition’s thrall. A bigot priesthood,--or a venal train Of selfish nobles, (such as govern Spain,) Can shackle millions! boasted reas’ning kind! And awe, through fear of ills unknown, the mind. Heavens! how they creep,--and cringe,--and fawn,--and fear These earthly Gods--and meanly stoop to bear Insult, and slav’ry’s yoke, to buy an hour Of shameful life: whilst, in the lust of pow’r, Their haughty despot sends his mandate forth, And makes a prison-house of this fair earth: Nor nobly dare to strike for Liberty, And die for Truth,--but, with servility, Shake like weak reeds which by the rivers stand, And bend obsequious to the dread command.