O Land whom the Gods,--loving most,--most sorely in wisdom have tried, England! since Time was Time, thrice swept by the conqueror tide, Why on thyself thrice turn, thrice crimson thy greenness in gore, With the slain of thy children, as sheep, thy meadows whitening-o'er? Race impatiently patient; tenacious of foe as of friend; Slow to take flame; but, enflamed, that burns thyself out to the end: Slow to return to the balance, once moved; not easily sway'd From the centre, and, star-like, retracing thy orbit through sunlight and shade! --Without hate, without party affection, we now look back on the fray, Through the mellowing magic of time the phantoms emerging to day! Grasping too much for self, unjust to his rival in strife, Each foe with good conscience and honour advances; war to the knife! Lo, where with feebler hand the Stuart essays him to guide The disdainful coursers of Henry, the Tudor car in its pride! For he saw not the past was past; nor the swirl and inrush of the tide, A nation arising in manhood; its will would no more be denied. They would share in the labour and peril of State; they must perish or win; 'Tis the instinct of Freedom that cries; a voice of Nature within! Narrow the cry and sectarian oft: true sons of their age; Justice avenged unjustly; yet more in sorrow than rage; Till they drank the poison of power, the Circe-cup of command, And the face of Liberty fail'd, and the sword was snatch'd from her hand. Now Law 'neath the scaffold cowers, and,--shame engendering shame,-- The hell-pack of war is laid close on the land for ruin and flame. For as things most holy are worst, from holiness when they decline, So Law, in the name of law once outraged, demon-divine, Swoops back as Anarchy arm'd, and maddens her lovers of yore, Changed from their former selves, and clothed in the chrisom of gore. Then Falkland and Hampden are gone; and darker counsels arise; Vane with his tortuous soul, through over-wisdom unwise; Pym, deep stately designer, the subtle in simple disguised, Artist in plots, projector of panics he used, and despised! --But as, in the mountain world, where the giants each lift up their horn To the skies defiant and pale, and our littleness measure and scorn, Frowning-out from their far-off summits: and eye and mind may not know Which is hugest, where all are huge: But, as from the region we go Receding, the Titan of Titans comes forth, and above him the sky Is deepest: and lo!--'tis the White One, the Monarch!--He mounts, as we fly! Or as over the sea the gay ships and the dolphins glisten and flit, And then that Leviathan comes, and takes his pastime in it; And wherever he ploughs his dark road, they must sink or follow him still, For his is the bulkiest strength, the proud and paramount will! --Thou wast great, O King! (for we grudge not the style thou didst yearn- for in vain, But a river of blood was between and an ineffaceable stain), Great with an earth-born greatness; a Titan of awe, not of love;