Ye that the rising morn invidious mark, And hate the light—because your deeds are dark; Ye that expanding truth invidious view, And think, or wish, the song of HOPE untrue; Perhaps your little hands presume to span The march of Genius, and the powers of man; Perhaps ye watch, at Pride’s unhallowed shrine, Her victims, newly slain, and thus divine:— “Here shall thy triumph, Genius, cease, and here Truth, Science, Virtue, close your short career.” Tyrants! in vain ye trace the wizard ring; In vain ye limit Mind’s unwearied spring: What! can ye lull the wingèd winds asleep, Arrest the rolling world, or chain the deep? No!—the wild wave contemns your sceptred hand. It rolled not back when Canute gave command! Man! can thy doom no brighter soul allow? Still must thou live a blot on Nature’s brow? Shall War’s polluted banner ne’er be furled? Shall crimes and tyrants cease but with the world? What! are thy triumphs, sacred Truth, belied? Why then hath Plato lived—or Sidney died?— Ye fond adorers of departed fame, Who warm at Scipio’s worth, or Tully’s name! Ye that, in fancied vision, can admire The sword of Brutus, and the Theban lyre! Rapt in historic ardour, who adore Each classic haunt, and well-remembered shore. Where Valour tuned, amid her chosen throng, The Thracian trumpet and the Spartan song; Or, wandering thence, behold the later charms Of England’s glory, and Helvetia’s arms! See Roman fire in Hampden’s bosom swell, And fate and freedom in the shaft of Tell! Say, ye fond zealots to the worth of yore, Hath Valour left the world—to live no more? No more shall Brutus bid a tyrant die, And sternly smile with vengeance in his eye? Hampden no more, when suffering Freedom calls, Encounter Fate, and triumph as he falls? Nor Tell disclose, through peril and alarm, The might that slumbers in a peasant’s arm? Yes! in that generous cause, for ever strong, The patriot’s virtue and the poet’s song, Still, as the tide of ages rolls away, Shall charm the world, unconscious of decay! Yes! there are hearts, prophetic HOPE may trust, That slumber yet in uncreated dust, Ordained to fire the adoring sons of earth With every charm of wisdom and of worth; Ordained to light, with intellectual day, The mazy wheels of Nature as they play, Or, warm with Fancy’s energy, to glow, And rival all but Shakspeare’s name below! And say, supernal Powers! who deeply scan Heaven’s dark decrees, unfathomed yet by man, When shall the world call down, to cleanse her shame, That embryo spirit, yet without a name,— That friend of Nature, whose avenging hands Shall burst the Lybian’s adamantine bands? Who, sternly marking on his native soil The blood, the tears, the anguish, and the toil, Shall bid each righteous heart exult, to see Peace to the slave, and vengeance on the free!