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 | The Repeal of the Missouri Compromise |  |
And, when the emigrant shall come
To seek and choose a future home,
He soon will find that honest toil
Performed upon the virgin soil,
Will class him with the negro slave,
However honorable and brave.
And there the haughty tyrant's frown
Will weigh his gentle spirit down;
His children, too, will shun disgrace
And seek a more congenial place—
A place where Slavery's with'ring power
Does not oppress the honest poor.
Slavery and Freedom both agree?
'Twould be a strange anomaly!
The serpent and the nestling rest
Together in the self-same nest?
The wolf brought to the fold to sleep
Beside the weak and harmless sheep?
A sober, honest, upright man
An inmate of the robber's den?
These dwell together? surely, no!
The serpent, wolf, and robber too,
Would on his weak companion prey
Or drive him forcibly away.
To seek and choose a future home,
He soon will find that honest toil
Performed upon the virgin soil,
Will class him with the negro slave,
However honorable and brave.
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Will weigh his gentle spirit down;
His children, too, will shun disgrace
And seek a more congenial place—
A place where Slavery's with'ring power
Does not oppress the honest poor.
Slavery and Freedom both agree?
'Twould be a strange anomaly!
The serpent and the nestling rest
Together in the self-same nest?
The wolf brought to the fold to sleep
Beside the weak and harmless sheep?
A sober, honest, upright man
An inmate of the robber's den?
These dwell together? surely, no!
The serpent, wolf, and robber too,
Would on his weak companion prey
Or drive him forcibly away.
| The Repeal of the Missouri Compromise | |