Page:Zinzendorff and Other Poems.pdf/164

164 Or the broad seas, or the bright tropic-isles Where Nature in her noon-day faintness holds A long siesta, still their hearts enshrine Liberty as a God. There, 'neath the shade Of the Collisseum vaulting up to Heaven, The time-spar'd arch, the mighty Basilic, Palace, and pantheon, and monument, Where throng a wondering world in pilgrimage, They bow no knee to Cesar, but compel The kingly Tiber to pronounce the name Of their own Washington. Sublime they pour Warm Memory's incense to their Country's Sire, He, who in pliant infancy was train'd By Spartan nurture first to rule himself, And then a young, embattled host to lead Through toil and terror, to a glorious seat Among the nations. Then when every eye Of every clime was bent on him with awe Like adoration, from his breast he rent The adhesive panoply of power, retir'd From the loud peans of a world, to sleep Uncrown'd, uncoronetted, 'mid the soil His hands had till'd. Henceforth let none decry The majesty of virtue, since she stands Simply on the high places of the earth, Her open forehead to the scanning stars, And the pure-hearted worship her, while Pride And tyrant power and laurell'd Victory Do give their sculptur'd trophies to the owl, And noisome bat, and to the shades pass on With such memorial as ne'er wrung a tear.