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(Excerpt)
LISTEN to his rich words, intoned | |
| To songs of lofty cheer, | |
| Who in the howling wilderness, | |
| Mid forests wild and drear, | |
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| Breathed not of exile nor of wrong, | 5 |
| Through the long winter nights, | |
| But uttered in exulting song, | |
| The soul’s unchartered rights; | |
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| Who sought the oracles of God | |
| In the heart’s veiléd shrine, | 10 |
| Nor asked the monarch nor the priest, | |
| His sacred laws to sign. | |
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| The brave, high heart that would not yield | |
| Its liberty of thought, | |
| Far o’er the melancholy main, | 15 |
| Through bitter trials brought; | |
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| But, to a double exile doomed, | |
| By Faith’s pure guidance led,— | |
| Through the dark labyrinth of life, | |
| Held fast her golden thread. | 20 |
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| Listen! The music of his dream | |
| Perchance may linger still | |
| In the old familiar places | |
| Beneath the emerald hill. | |
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| The wave-worn rock still breasts the storm | 25 |
| On Seekonk’s lonely side, | |
| Where the dusk natives hailed the bark | |
| That bore their gentle guide. | |
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| The spring that gushed amid the wild | |
| In music on his ear, | 30 |
| Still pours its waters, undefiled, | |
| The fainting heart to cheer. | |
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| And the fair cove, that slept so calm | |
| Beneath o’ershadowing hills, | |
| And bore the exile’s evening psalm | 35 |
| Far up its flowery rills,— | |
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| The wave that parted to receive | |
| The pilgrim’s light canoe, | |
| As if an angel’s balmy wing | |
| Had stirred its waters blue,— | 40 |
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| What though the fire-winged courser’s breath | |
| Has swept its cooling tide, | |
| And fast before its withering blast, | |
| The rushing wave has dried, | |
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| Still, narrowed to our crowded mart,— | 45 |
| A fair enchanted mere,— | |
| In the proud city’s throbbing heart | |
| It sleeps serene and clear. | |
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| Or turn we to the green hill’s side; | |
| There, with the spring-time showers, | 50 |
| The white-thorn o’er a nameless grave, | |
| Rains its pale, silver flowers. | |
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| Yet memory lingers with the past, | |
| Nor vainly seeks to trace | |
| His footprints on a rock, whence time | 55 |
| Nor tempests can efface; | |
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| Whereon he planted, fast and deep, | |
| The roof-tree of a home | |
| Wide as the wings of Love may sweep, | |
| Free as her thoughts may roam; | 60 |
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| Where through all time the saints may dwell, | |
| And from pure fountains draw | |
| That peace which passeth human thought, | |
| In liberty and law. | |
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