Part 128 (1/2)

The borrowed pomp, the armed array, Want, fear, and impotence, betray Strange proofs of power divine!

3 If service due from human kind, To men in slothful ease reclined, Can form a sovereign's claim: Hail, monarchs! ye, whom Heaven ordains, Our toils unshared, to share our gains, Ye idiots, blind and lame!

4 Superior virtue, wisdom, might, Create and mark the ruler's right, So reason must conclude: Then thine it is, to whom belong The wise, the virtuous, and the strong, Thrice sacred mult.i.tude!

5 In thee, vast All! are these contained, For thee are those, thy parts ordained, So nature's systems roll: The sceptre's thine, if such there be; If none there is, then thou art free, Great monarch! mighty whole!

6 Let the proud tyrant rest his cause On faith, prescription, force, or laws, An host's or senate's voice!

His voice affirms thy stronger due, Who for the many made the few, And gave the species choice.

7 Unsanctified by thy command, Unowned by thee, the sceptred hand The trembling slave may bind; But loose from nature's moral ties, The oath by force imposed belies The una.s.senting mind.

8 Thy will's thy rule, thy good its end; You punish only to defend What parent nature gave: And he who dares her gifts invade, By nature's oldest law is made Thy victim or thy slave.

9 Thus reason founds the just degree On universal liberty, Not private rights resigned: Through various nature's wide extent, No private beings e'er were meant To hurt the general kind.

10 Thee justice guides, thee right maintains, The oppressor's wrongs, the pilferer's gains, Thy injured weal impair.

Thy warmest pa.s.sions soon subside, Nor partial envy, hate, nor pride, Thy tempered counsels share.

11 Each instance of thy vengeful rage, Collected from each clime and age, Though malice swell the sum, Would seem a spotless scanty scroll, Compared with Marius' b.l.o.o.d.y roll, Or Sylla's hippodrome.

12 But thine has been imputed blame, The unworthy few a.s.sume thy name, The rabble weak and loud; Or those who on thy ruins feast, The lord, the lawyer, and the priest; A more ign.o.ble crowd.

13 Avails it thee, if one devours, Or lesser spoilers share his powers, While both thy claim oppose?

Monsters who wore thy sullied crown, Tyrants who pulled those monsters down, Alike to thee were foes.

14 Far other shone fair Freedom's band, Far other was the immortal stand, When Hampden fought for thee: They s.n.a.t.c.hed from rapine's gripe thy spoils, The fruits and prize of glorious toils, Of arts and industry.

15 On thee yet foams the preacher's rage, On thee fierce frowns the historian's page, A false apostate train: Tears stream adown the martyr's tomb; Unpitied in their harder doom, Thy thousands strow the plain.

16 These had no charms to please the sense, No graceful port, no eloquence, To win the Muse's throng: Unknown, unsung, unmarked they lie; But Caesar's fate o'ercasts the sky, And Nature mourns his wrong.

17 Thy foes, a frontless band, invade; Thy friends afford a timid aid, And yield up half the right.

Even Locke beams forth a mingled ray, Afraid to pour the flood of day On man's too feeble sight.

18 Hence are the motley systems framed, Of right transferred, of power reclaimed; Distinctions weak and vain.

Wise nature mocks the wrangling herd; For unreclaimed, and untransferred, Her powers and rights remain.

19 While law the royal agent moves, The instrument thy choice approves, We bow through him to you.

But change, or cease the inspiring choice, The sovereign sinks a private voice, Alike in one, or few!

20 Shall then the wretch, whose dastard heart Shrinks at a tyrant's n.o.bler part, And only dares betray; With reptile wiles, alas! prevail, Where force, and rage, and priestcraft fail, To pilfer power away?

21 Oh! shall the bought, and buying tribe, The slaves who take, and deal the bribe, A people's claims enjoy!

So Indian murderers hope to gain The powers and virtues of the slain, Of wretches they destroy.

22 'Avert it, Heaven! you love the brave, You hate the treacherous, willing slave, The self-devoted head; Nor shall an hireling's voice convey That sacred prize to lawless sway, For which a nation bled.'

23 Vain prayer, the coward's weak resource!

Directing reason, active force, Propitious Heaven bestows.

But ne'er shall flame the thundering sky, To aid the trembling herd that fly Before their weaker foes.