Page:Complete Poetical Works of John Greenleaf Whittier (1895).djvu/313

Rh While the Church, wrangling upon points of faith, Forgets her bondmen suffering unto death; While crafty Traffic and the lust of Gain Unite to forge Oppression’s triple chain, One door is open, and one Temple free, As a resting-place for hunted Liberty! Where men may speak, unshackled and unawed, High words of Truth, for Freedom and for God. And when that truth its perfect work hath done, And rich with blessings o’er our land hath gone; When not a slave beneath his yoke shall pine, From broad Potomac to the far Sabine: When unto angel lips at last is given The silver trump of Jubilee in Heaven; And from Virginia’s plains, Kentucky’s shades, And through the dim Floridian everglades, Rises, to meet that angel-trumpet’s sound, The voice of millions from their chains unbound; Then, though this Hall be crumbling in decay, Its strong walls blending with the common clay, Yet round the ruins of its strength shall stand The best and noblest of a ransomed land— Pilgrims, like these who throng around the shrine Of Mecca, or of holy Palestine! A prouder glory shall that ruin own Than that which lingers round the Parthenon. Here shall the child of after years be taught The works of Freedom which his fathers wrought; Told of the trials of the present hour, Our weary strife with prejudice and power; How the high errand quickened woman’s soul, And touched her lip as with a living coal; How Freedom’s martyrs kept their lofty faith True and unwavering, unto bonds and death; The pencil’s art shall sketch the ruined Hall, The Muses’ garland crown its aged wall, And History’s pen for after times record Its consecration unto Freedom’s God!

wave is breaking on the shore,
 * The echo fading from the chime;

Again the shadow moveth o’er
 * The dial-plate of time!

O seer-seen Angel! waiting now
 * With weary feet on sea and shore,

Impatient for the last dread vow
 * That time shall be no more!

Once more across thy sleepless eye
 * The semblance of a smile has passed:

The year departing leaves more nigh
 * Time’s fearfullest and last.

Oh, in that dying year hath been
 * The sum of all since time began;

The birth and death, the joy and pain,
 * Of Nature and of Man.

Spring, with her change of sun and shower,
 * And streams released from Winter’s chain,

And bursting bud, and opening flower,
 * And greenly growing grain;

And Summer’s shade, and sunshine warm,
 * And rainbows o’er her hill-tops bowed,

And voices in her rising storm;
 * God speaking from His cloud!

And Autumn’s fruits and clustering sheaves,
 * And soft, warm days of golden light,

The glory of her forest leaves,
 * And harvest-moon at night;

And Winter with her leafless grove,
 * And prisoned stream, and drifting snow,

The brilliance of her heaven above
 * And of her earth below:

And man, in whom an angel’s mind
 * With earth’s low instincts finds abode,

The highest of the links which bind
 * Brute nature to her God;

His infant eye hath seen the light,
 * His childhood’s merriest laughter rung,

And active sports to manlier might
 * The nerves of boyhood strung!