Indignant Sentiments on National Prejudices and hatred: and on Slavery.
Он, for a lodge in some vast wilderness,
Some boundless contiguity of shade,
Where rumor of oppression and deceit,
Of unsuccessful or successful war.
Might never reach me more! My ear is pain'd,
My soul is sick with ev'ry day's report
Of wrong and outrage with which earth is fill'd.
There is no flesh in man's obdurate heart;
It does not feel for man. The nat'ral bond
Of brotherhood is sever'd, as the flax
That falls asunder at the touch of fire.
He finds his fellow guilty of a skin
Not colour'd like his own; and having pow'r
T'enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause
Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey.
Lands intersected by a narrow frith
Abhor each other. Mountains interpos'd
Make enemies of nations, who had else,
Like kindred drops, been mingled into one.
Thus man devotes his brother, and destroys;
And worse than all, and most to be deplor'd,
As human nature's broadest, foulest blot,
Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts his sweat
With stripes, that Mercy, with a bleeding heart,
Weeps when she sees inflicted on a beast.
Then what is man! And what man seeing this
And having human feelings, does not blush
And hang his head, to think himself a man?
I would not have a slave to till my ground,
To carry me, to fan me while I sleep,
And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth
That sinews bought and sold have ever earn'd.
No: dear as freedom is, and in my heart's
Just estimation, prized above all price;
I had much rather be myself the slave,
And wear the bonds, than fasten them on him.
We have no slaves at home-then why abroad?
And they themselves once ferried o'er the wave
That parts us, are emancipate and loos'd.
Slaves cannot breathe in England; if their lungs
Receive our air, that moment they are free;
They touch our country and their shackles fall.
That's noble, and bespeaks a nation proud
And jealous of the blessing. Spread it then,
And let it circulate through ev'ry vein
Of all your empire; that where Britain's power
Is felt, mankind may feel her mercy too.
THE MISERIES OF HUMAN LIFE.
Ah, little think the gay licentious proud, Whom pleasure, pow'r, and affluence surround; 'They who their thoughtless hours in giddy mirth, And wanton, often cruel riot waste;
Ah little think they, while they dance along,
How many feel, this very moment, death,
And all the sad variety of pain!
How many sink in the devouring flood,
Or more devouring flame! How many bleed,
By shameful variance betwixt man and man!
How many pine in want, and dungeon glooms,
Shut from the common air, and common use
Of their own limbs! How many drink the cup
Of baleful grief, or eat the bitter bread
Of misery! Sore pierc'd by wintry winds,
How many shrink into the sordid hut
Of cheerless poverty! How many shake
With all the fiercer tortures of the mind,
Unbounded passion, madness, guilt, remorse!
How many rack'd with honest passions, droop
In deep retir'd distress! How many stand
Around the death-bed of their dearest friends,
And point the parting anguish! Thought fond
Of these, and all the thousand nameless ills,
That one incessant struggle render life
One scene of toil, of suffering, and of fate,
Vice in his high career would stand appall'd,
And heedless, rambling impulse learn to think;
The conscious heart of charity would warm,,
And her wide wish benevolence dilate;
The social tear would rise, the social sigh;
And into clear perfection, gradual bliss,
Refining still, the social passions work.
UNHAPPY CLOSE OF LIFE.
How shocking must thy summons be, O
Death!
To him that is at ease in his possessions!
Who counting on long years of pleasure here,
Is quite unfurnished for the world to come!.
In that dread moment, how the frantic soul
Raves round the walls of her clay tenement;
Runs to each avenue, and shrieks for help;
But shrieks in vain! How wishfully she looks
'On all she's leaving, now no longer hers!
A little longer! yet a little longer;
O might she stay to wash away her stains;
And fit her for the passage! Mournful sight!:
Her very eyes weep blood; and ev'ry groan
She heaves is big with horror. But the foe,
Like a staunch murd'rer, steady to his purpose,
Pursues her close, thro' ev'ry lane of life;
Nor misses once the track; but presses on, ,Till forc'd at last to the tremendous verge, At once she sinks to everlasting ruin!
CRUELTY TO BRUTES Censured.
I would not enter on my list of friends, (Though grac'd with polish'd manners and fine
Yet wanting sensibility,) the man
Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm.
An inadvertent step may crush the snail,
That crawls at evening in the public path;
But he that has humanity, forewarn'd
Will tread aside, and let the reptile live.
The creeping vermin, loathsome to the sight,
And charg'd perhaps with venom, that intrudes
A visitor unwelcome into scenes
Sacred to neatness and repose, th' alcove,
The chamber, or refectory, may die.
A necessary act incurs no blame.
Not so, when held within their proper bounds,
And guiltless of offence, they range the air,
Or take their pastime in the spacious field;
There they are privileg'd. And he that hunts
Or harms them there, is guilty of a wrong;
Disturbs th' economy of nature's realm,
Who, when she form'd, design'd them an abode.
The sum is this: if man's convenience, health,
Or safety, interfere, his rights and claims,
Are paramount, and must extinguish theirs.
Else they are all-the meanest things that are,
As free to live and enjoy that life,
As God was free to form them at the first,
Who in his sovereign wisdom, made them all.
Ye, therefore, who love mercy, teach your sons
To love it too. The spring time of our years
Is soon dishonour'd and defiled, in most,
By budding ills, that ask a prudent hand
To check them. But, alas! none sooner shoots
If unrestrained into luxuriant growth,
Than cruelty, most dev'lish of them all.
Mercy to him that shews it, is the rule
And righteous limitation of its act,
By which heaven moves in pard'ning guilty man:
And he that shows none, being ripe in years,
And conscious of the outrage he commits,
Shall seek it, and not find it in his turn.
Yes, to deep sadness sullenly resign'd,
He feels his body's bondage in his mind;
Puts off his generous nature; and, to suit
His manners with his fate, puts on the brute,,
O most degrading of all ills: that wait
On man, a mourner in his best estate!
All other sorrows virtue may endure
And find submission more than half a cure;
Grief is itself a medicine, and bestow'd
T'improve the fortitude that bears the load,
To teach the wanderer, as his woes increase
The path of wisdom, all whose paths are peace;;
But slavery! virtue dreads it as her grave:
Patience itself is meanness in a slave!
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