Page:Complete Poetical Works of John Greenleaf Whittier (1895).djvu/316

284   That temple now in ruin lies!
 * The fire-stain on its shattered wall,

And open to the changing skies
 * Its black and roofless hall,

It stands before a nation’s sight, A gravestone over buried Right!

But from that ruin, as of old,
 * The fire-scorched stones themselves are crying,

And from their ashes white and cold
 * Its timbers are replying!

A voice which slavery cannot kill Speaks from the crumbling arches still!

And even this relic from thy shrine,
 * O holy Freedom! hath to me

A potent power, a voice and sign
 * To testify of thee;

And, grasping it, methinks I feel A deeper faith, a stronger zeal.

And not unlike that mystic rod,
 * Of old stretched o’er the Egyptian wave,

Which opened, in the strength of God,
 * A pathway for the slave,

It yet may point the bondman’s way, And turn the spoiler from his prey.

, let them gather! Summon forth The pledged philanthropy of Earth. From every land, whose hills have heard The bugle blast of Freedom waking; Or shrieking of her symbol-bird
 * From out his cloudy eyrie breaking:

Where Justice hath one worshipper, Or truth one altar built to her; Where’er a human eye is weeping
 * O’er wrongs which Earth’s sad children know ;

Where’er a single heart is keeping
 * Its prayerful watch with human woe:

Thence let them come, and greet each other, And know in each a friend and brother!

Yes, let them come! from each green vale
 * Where England’s old baronial halls

Still bear upon their storied walls The grim crusader’s rusted mail, Battered by Paynim spear and brand On Malta’s rock or Syria’s sand! And mouldering pennon-staves once set
 * Within the soil of Palestine,

By Jordan and Gennesaret;
 * Or, borne with England’s battle line

O’er Acre’s shattered turrets stooping, Or, midst the camp their banners drooping,
 * With dews from hallowed Hermon wet,

A holier summons now is given Than that gray hermit’s voice of old, Which unto all the winds of heaven
 * The banners of the Cross unrolled!

Not for the long-deserted shrine;
 * Not for the dull unconscious sod,

Which tells not by one lingering sign
 * That there the hope of Israel trod;

But for that truth, for which alone
 * In pilgrim eyes are sanctified

The garden moss, the mountain stone, Whereon His holy sandals pressed,— The fountain which His lip hath blessed,— Whate’er hath touched His garment’s hem
 * At Bethany or Bethlehem,
 * Or Jordan’s river-side.

For Freedom in the name of Him
 * Who came to raise Earth’s drooping poor,

To break the chain from every limb, The bolt from every prison door! For these, o’er all the earth hath passed An ever-deepening trumpet blast, As if an angel’s breath had lent Its vigor to the instrument.

And Wales, from Snowden’s mountain wall, Shall startle at that thrilling call,
 * As if she heard her bards again;

And Erin’s “harp on Tara’s wall” Give out its ancient strain, Mirthful and sweet, yet sad withal,—
 * The melody which Erin loves,

When o’er that harp, ’mid bursts of gladness And slogan cries and lyke-wake sadness,
 * The hand of her O’Connell moves!

Scotland, from lake and tarn and rill, And mountain hold, and heathery hill,