Go to the men for whom, in ocean's halls, The oyster breeds, and the green turtle sprawls. There corks are drawn, and the red vintage flows, To fill the swelling veins for thee; and now The ruddy cheek, and now the ruddier nose, Shall tempt thee as thou flittest round the brow; And when the hour of sleep its quiet brings, No angry hand shall rise to brush thy wings.
GOD EVERYWHERE IN NATURE. How desolate were nature, and how void Of every charm, how like a naked waste Of Africa, were not a present God Beheld employing, in its various scenes, His active might to animate and adorn! What life and beauty, when, in all that breathes, Or moves, or grows, his hand is viewed at work! When it is viewed unfolding every bud,
Each blossom tingeing, shaping every leaf, Wafting each cloud that passes o'er the sky, Rolling each billow, moving every wing That fans the air, and every warbling throat Heard in the tuneful woodlands! In the least As well as in the greatest of his works Is ever manifest his presence kind ; As well in swarms of glittering insects, seen Quick to and fro within a foot of air, Dancing a merry hour, then seen no more, As in the systems of resplendent worlds, Through time revolving in unbounded space. His eye, while comprehending in one view The whole creation, fixes full on me ;
As on me shines the sun with his full blaze, While o'er the hemisphere he spreads the same, His hand, while holding oceans in its palm, And compassing the skies, surrounds my life, Guards the poor rushlight from the blast of death.
The Star-spangled banner.
on you see by the dawn's early light so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming. Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the clouds of the figh we watched were so gallantly streaming
O'er the ramparts And the rocket's red glave-the bomb bursting Game proof through the night that our flag was still there? Sag, dass that star. opangled banner get warre Over the law of the free the home of the brave
WAR FOR THE SAKE OF PEACE.
O FIRST of human blessings, and supreme! Fair Peace! how lovely, how delightful thou! By whose wide tie the kindred sons of men Like brothers live, in amity combined And unsuspicious faith; while honest toil Gives every joy, and to those joys a right Which idle, barbarous rapine but usurps. Pure is thy reign; when, unaccursed by blood, Naught, save the sweetness of indulgent showers, Trickling, distills into the vernant glebe; Instead of mangled carcasses, sad seen, When the blithe sheaves lie scattered o'er the
When only shining shares, the crooked knife, And hooks imprint the vegetable wound; When the land blushes with the rose alone, The falling fruitage, and the bleeding vine. O Peace! thou source and soul of social life; Beneath whose calm inspiring influence Science his views enlarges, Art refines, And swelling commerce opens all her ports; Blessed be the man divine who gives us thee! Who bids the trumpet hush his horrid clang, Nor blow the giddy nations into rage; Who sheathes the murderous blade; the deadly gun
Into the well-piled armory returns ; And, every vigor from the work of death To grateful industry converting, makes The country flourish and the city smile. Unviolated, him the virgin sings, And him the smiling mother to her train. Of him the shepherd in the peaceful dale Chants; and, the treasures of his labor sure, The husbandman of him, as at the plow Or team he toils. With him the sailor soothes, Beneath the trembling moon, the midnight wave; And the full city, warm, from street to street And shop to shop responsive, rings of him. Nor joys one land alone; his praise extends Far as the sun rolls the diffusive day; Far as the breeze can bear the gifts of peace, Till all the happy nations catch the song.
What would not, Peace! the patriot bear for thee?
What painful patience? What incessant care? What mixed anxiety? What sleepless toil? E'en from the rash protected, what reproach? For he thy value knows; thy friendship he To human nature: but the better thou, The richer of delight, sometimes the more Inevitable WAR, when ruffian force Awakes the fury of an injured state. Roused by bold insult and injurious rage, E'en the good patient man whom reason rules, With sharp and sudden check the astonished sons His bolder heart; in awful justice clad ; Of violence confounds; firm as his cause His eyes effulging a peculiar fire : And, as he charges through the prostrate war, His keen arm teaches faithless men no more To dare the sacred vengeance of the just.
Then ardent rise! O, great in vengeance rise! O'erturn the proud, teach rapine to restore; And, as you ride sublimely round the world, Make every vessel stoop, make every state At once their welfare and their duty know. JAMES THOMSON.
KING PHILIP. By heaven, lady, you shall have
To curse the fair proceedings of this day. Have I not pawned to you my majesty? CONSTANCE. You have beguiled me with a counterfeit,
Resembling majesty; which, being touched and tried,
Proves valueless: you are forsworn, forsworn; You came in arms to spill mine enemies' blood, But now in arms you strengthen it with yours: The grappling vigor and rough frown of war Is cold, in amity and painted peace, And our oppression hath made up this league:
Arm, arm, you heavens, against these perjured kings!
A widow cries; be husband to me, heavens ! Let not the hours of this ungodly day Wear out the day in peace; but, ere sunset, Set armed discord 'twixt these perjured kings! Hear me, O, hear me !
AUSTRIA. Lady Constance, peace. CONSTANCE. War! war! no peace! peace is to
Now went forth the morn, Such as in highest heaven, arrayed in gold Empyreal; from before her vanished night, Shot through with orient beams; when all the plain
Covered with thick embattled squadrons bright, Chariots, and flaming arms, and fiery steeds, Reflecting blaze on blaze, first met his view. Clouds began
How glorious fall the valiant, sword in hand, To darken all the hill, and smoke to roll
In front of battle for their native land! But O, what ills await the wretch that yields, A recreant outcast from his country's fields ! The monarch whom he loves shall quit her home, An aged father at his side shall roam; His little ones shall weeping with him go, And a young wife participate his woe; While, scorned and scowled upon by every face, They pine for food, and beg from place to place.
Stain of his breed! dishonoring manhood's form,
All ills shall cleave to him :- Affliction's storm Shall blind him, wandering in the vale of years, Till, lost to all but ignominious fears,
He shall not blush to leave a recreant's name, And children, like himself, inured to shame.
But we will combat for our fathers' land, And we will drain the life-blood where we stand To save our children :- fight ye side by side, And serried close, ye men of youthful pride, Disdaining fear, and deeming light the cost Of life itself in glorious battle lost.
Leave not our sires to stem the unequal fight, Whose limbs are nerved no more with buoyant might;
Nor, lagging backward, let the younger breast Permit the man of age (a sight unblessed) To welter in the combat's foremost thrust, His hoary head disheveled in the dust, And venerable bosom bleeding bare.
In dusky wreaths, reluctant flames, the sign Of wrath awaked; nor with less dread the lond Ethereal trumpet from on high 'gan blow; At which command the powers militant That stood for heaven, in mighty quadrate joined Of union irresistible, moved on
In silence their bright legions, to the sound Of instrumental harmony, that breathed Heroic ardor to adventurous deeds Under their godlike leaders, in the cause Of God and his Messiah. On they move Indissolubly firm; nor obvious hill, Nor straitening vale, nor wood, nor stream, divides Their perfect ranks; for high above the ground Their march was, and the passive air uphore Their nimble tread. As when the total kind Of birds, in orderly array on wing, Came summoned over Eden to receive Their names of thee; so over many a tract Of heaven they marched, and many a province wide,
Tenfold the length of this terrene; at last, Far in the horizon to the north appeared From skirt to skirt a fiery region, stretched In battailous aspect, and nearer view Of rigid spears, and helmets thronged, and shields Bristled with upright beams innumerable Various, with boastful argument portrayed, The banded powers of Satan hasting on With furious expedition; for they weened That selfsame day, by fight, or by surprise, To win the mount of God, and on his throne To set the envier of his state, the proud Aspirer; but their thoughts proved fond and vain In the midway though strange to us it seemed
But youth's fair form, though fall'n, is ever At first, that angel should with angel war,
And beautiful in death the boy appears, The hero boy, that dies in blooming years: In man's regret he lives, and woman's tears; More sacred than in life, and lovelier far For having perished in the front of war.
And in fierce hosting meet, who wont to meet So oft in festivals of joy and love Unanimous, as sons of one great Sire, Hymning the Eternal Father. But the shout Of battle now began, and rushing sound Of onset ended soon each milder thought. by THOMAS CAMPыELL. | High in the midst, exalted as a god,
From the Greek of TYRTÆUS,
« ZurückWeiter » |