Page:Oregon, her history, her great men, her literature.djvu/369

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"In the presence of God—I say it reverently—freedom is the rule, and slavery is the exception. It is a marked, guarded, perfected exception. There it stands! If public opinion must not touch its dusky cheek too roughly, be it so; but we will go no further than the terms of the compact. We are a city set on a hill. Our light cannot be hid. As for me, I dare not, I will not be false to freedom! Where in youth my feet were planted, there my manhood and my age shall march. I will walk beneath her banner. I will glory in her strength. I have seen her, in history, struck down on a hundred chosen fields of battle. I have seen her friends fly from her, I have seen her foes gather around her; I have seen them bind her to the stake; I have seen them give her ashes to the winds, regathering them that they might scatter them yet more widely. But when they turned to exult, I have seen her again meet them face to face, clad in complete steel, and brandishing in her strong right hand a flaming sword red with insufferable light! And I take courage. The Genius of America will at last lead her sons to freedom."

Dost thou seek a star, with thy swelling crest,

Oh! wave that leavest thy mother's breast?

Dost thou leap from the prisoned depths below

In scorn of their calm and constant flow?

Or art thou seeking some distant land,

To die in murmurs upon the strand?

Has! thou tales to tell of the pearl-lit deep,

Where the wave-whelmed mariner rocks in sleep?

Canst thou speak of navies that sunk in pride,

Ere the roll of their thunder in echo died?

What trophies, what banners, are floating free

In the shadowy depths of that silent sea?