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| WHAT constitutes a state? | |
| Not high-raised battlement or labored mound, | |
| Thick wall or moated gate; | |
| Not cities proud with spires and turrets crowned; | |
| Not bays and broad-armed ports, | 5 |
| Where, laughing at the storm, rich navies ride; | |
| Not starred and spangled courts, | |
| Where low-browed baseness wafts perfume to pride. | |
| No:—men, high-minded men, | |
| With powers as far above dull brutes endued | 10 |
| In forest, brake, or den, | |
| As beasts excel cold rocks and brambles rude,— | |
| Men who their duties know, | |
| But know their rights, and, knowing, dare maintain, | |
| Prevent the long-aimed blow, | 15 |
| And crush the tyrant while they rend the chain; | |
| These constitute a State; | |
| And sovereign law, that State’s collected will, | |
| O’er thrones and globes elate | |
| Sits empress, crowning good, repressing ill. | 20 |
| Smit by her sacred frown, | |
| The fiend, Dissension, like a vapor sinks; | |
| And e’en the all-dazzling crown | |
| Hides his faint rays, and at her bidding shrinks. | |
| Such was this heaven-loved isle, | 25 |
| Than Lesbos fairer and the Cretan shore! | |
| No more shall freedom smile? | |
| Shall Britons languish, and be men no more? | |
| Since all must life resign, | |
| Those sweet rewards which decorate the brave | 30 |
| ’T is folly to decline, | |
| And steal inglorious to the silent grave. | |
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