And all things great to be great deeming, Forever must the spurious scorn. The spirit that impelled the viking 'Gainst kingly power for freedom striking,-- That, threatened, sailed to Iceland strong With hero-fame and hero-song, And further on through all the ages,-- That spirit never dwells in cages. The spirit that at Hjörung broke For thousand years the foreign yoke, By might of king ne'er made to cower, Defying e'en the papal power,-- The spirit that, to weakness worn, Held free our soil with rights unshorn, Held free, with tongue and hand combined, 'Gainst foreign host and foreign mind,-- By which our Holberg's wit was whetted, And Wessel's sword and Wessel's pen, And to whose silent forge indebted The thoughts that armed our Eidsvold-men,-- The spirit that in faith so high Through Odin could to God draw nigh, As bridge the myth of Balder threw, And almost found the free way new To truth's fair home in radiant Gimle, When this was closed and warded grimly By monkish lies and papal speech,-- That threw a second bridge to reach On freedom's lightly soaring arches To heights whereon the free soul marches,-- So, when for Luther blood was shed, The North but razed a fence instead, --The spirit that, when men were deeming True faith in all the world were dead, Brun, Hauge, and their lineage spread, From soul-springs in our nation streaming,-- Though pietism's fog now thickens, Still guards the altar lights and quickens;-- Can _this_ they make the fashion better, By modern bishop-synod's letter? Is _this_ by politics provided, When into "Chambers" 't is divided? Can _this_ into a box be juggled And o'er the boundary be smuggled? And that just now when beacons lighted On all the mountain-tops are sighted, And when our folk-high-school's young day The Norse heart kindles with its ray, Renewing mem'ries, courage bringing, While they are hearing, trusting, singing;-- Just when the deep in billows surges, Responsive to the tempest's might, And over it the Northern Light Of Youth's refulgent hope emerges;-- Just when the spirit everywhere, While walls lie low as trumpets blare, Is breaking from the ancient forms, And will of youth the heights now storms. A battle-age,--and we are in it! The greatest thing on earth: to be Where powers that are bursting free, Self-shaping seek their place and win it;-- Our fusing passion all to give, To cast the statue that shall live, To press the mold of our own form On what shall be the future's norm, Into the age's soul thus breathed The spirit God to us bequeathed. 'T was this that now I wished to say To you, who late and early, aye Within time's workshop great are going, What is, what shall be, ever knowing;-- To you, who all our people's might Have roused for freedom new to fight;-- To whom our people gave this power, And sorrow, its eternal dower. THE CHILD IN OUR SOUL