 | A Hymn to Liberty |  |
A HYMN TO LIBERTY.
When rose the first and fairest morn,
Of antient and cœlestial race,
Rear'd in the purest part of space,
Descended with the early'st ray
That pour'd on infant Earth the day,
Divinest LIBERTY attend
Thy zealous votary and friend.
The sister thou, and pledge, of Love,
Sent by th'Omnipotent's decree,
To tell us that our acts are free,
Else Honour could no merit plead,
Nor Judgement damn the murd'rous deed,
All would be lay'd, all Love and Hate,
On hard Necessity and Fate!
Confess'd in all thy glorys stand,
Assume thy empire o'er the land;
That thine alone is Right divine:
Let each usurping tyrant see
His pow'r is from abusing thee:
His impious arms when Cæsar led,
Fair Liberty and Virtue bled;
When Brutus and when Cassius rose,
None fear'd but thine and Virtue's foes.
Arcadia saw her flocks encrease;
Loud o'er the meads her heifers low'd,
And streams not unfrequented flow'd;
The fatten'd soil with swelling grain
Rewarded the laborious swain;
With Joy her vocal forests rung;
And in the vales her poets sung:
Love triumph'd free from Vice and Care;
For Liberty presided there.
O! goddess of the good and wise,
How great thine influence in the tow'rs
Of Athens, and her learned bow'rs!
Wisdom thy fire, by thee sustain'd,
With majesty and freedom reign'd;
With thee investigated Truth:
Fancy and Judgement wing'd their way
Thro æther and the realms of day;
Thro the vast worlds of light they run,
And round the zodiac trace the sun:
In the delightful search they find
Th'harmonic pow'rs which rule the mind.
Cherish'd the social arts of peace,
And, when compel'd to take the field,
For thee was forg'd Minerva's shield:
For thee the Spartan valour stood;
For thee the plains were dy'd with blood:
Tyrtæus struck the martial shell
For thee, and bravely fought and fell:
Founders of empire and of laws,
Leaders of armys in thy cause,
That men might live from thraldom free,
Have prov'd in death their love of thee:
Th'Athenian sage from earth retir'd,
And Datames for thee expir'd.
Her noblest sons were sons of thine:
The splendor of barbaric crowns,
Nor the proud bloody pomp of war,
Surrounding the triumphant car,
The Scipios to the battel led:
For thee they strew'd the plains with dead;
For thee the brazen coat they wore,
And dy'd with Punic fields with gore.
Resplendent with distinguish'd rays,
Thy lov'd Cornelii wore their days:
When Tyranny with haughty strides,
Outrageous as Icarian tides,
Prepar'd her adamantine chain,
To bind each Roman to her reign,
They bade the monster cease to roar,
And bound her to the Afric shore.
Spares neither sex, nor rank, nor age,
With pride, revenge, and malice, arm'd,
Who can on beauty look uncharm'd,
Who, in the woful civil strife,
Insults o'er sanctity of life,
And who, in ev'ry act of shame,
Usurps fair Freedom's sacred name,
When she, dire foe to Rome's repose,
Beneath the Marian banner rose,
And strove, with sacrilegious hand,
To drive thee, goddess, from the land,
Aweful and lovely then in blood,
Sylla thy foremost champion stood;
And soon beneath his feet he treads
The monster with her thousand heads,
Assumes the dictatorial pow'r,
Rome's lord, Rome's sov'reign, of an hour.
The boyst'rous waves of faction lay'd,
The bloody debt to Justice pay'd,
The godlike man, whose mighty soul
Was fix'd to reach the destin'd goal,
Descended from the throne of state,
And by subjection rose more great,
Resign'd his pow'r to give it thee:
To thee, bright goddess, Virtue's child,
Like the sweet voice of Mercy mild,
The reins of government he gave,
Detesting pow'r that would enslave,
And then Rome's wonder and delight
Sat, like the sun, to rise more bright !
The realms which flourish'd once with thee:
With joy no vocal forests ring:
There Tyranny has took her stand,
Colossus like bestrides the land,
Forbids the continent to smile,
And gladness drives from ev'ry isle.
Great Rome, but Rome in her decay;
Where in the last and glorious strife
For Liberty, more dear than life,
Confus'd Misrule, and Riot rude,
The Stoic worth at last subdued;
Cato grew weary of the day,
And forc'd from hated life his way.
Soon the proud mistress of the world
From her high dignitys was hurl'd;
From that black ignominious date
The nations saw her dwindling state;
Her guardian Liberty was fled,
And she appear'd no more their dread:
Her honours lessen with her years,
Each cent'ry viler she appears,
Till, strip'd of her majestic air,
She sinks into the papal chair.
No Brutus now the scourge of kings;
No breast with patriot warmth is fir'd,
With Freedom none is there inspir'd:
See thro her solitary lands
Dejected looks and barren sands;
Whence banish'd is industrious Care,
While Lazyness sits brooding there.
Where flourish'd once the lively bow'rs
Of Science, deck'd with Attic flow'rs,
Now dreary rise monastic cells,
Where Ignorance with Horror dwells;
Where, with her unaffected mien,
Sincerity is never seen;
But, with her diabolic face,
Hypocrisy betrays the place.
O'er the once fam'd Ausonian plains
Has Superstition throw'd her chains,
And drags, they're riveted so strong,
Priests, potentates, and states, along.
Refreshing as the vernal breez,
Whom no sinister view beguiles,
Giver of cheerful looks and smiles,
With her morose and cruel band:
Far drive Licenciousness away;
Nor let Misrule nor Riot stay:
How oft' to injudicious eyes
Have they appear'd in Freedom's guise!
Oft' led th'unguarded nymph aside,
And spoil'd the treasures of a bride,
Forbad the radiant eye to close,
And rob'd the parent of repose!
They often have, with wild uproar,
Disgrac'd the hospitable floor,
And wasted in a wanton deed
As much as would a thousand feed.
Array'd with everlasting youth,
O! thou from whom derive their birth
Unsully'd Joy and blameless Mirth,
From whom the subject's safety springs,
Thou best security of kings,
Thy watchful eye o'er Britain throw,
And guard her from th'impending blow,
O! guard her from the worst of ills,
Which like Hyæna surely kills,
The bane of Truth, the bane of thee!
See how the base infection's spread!
Avert it from th'anointed head!
For trash the freeman's birthright's sold,
And Freedom barter'd is for gold!
This makes the rash and fatal choice,
In senates gains the venal voice!
This makes the judge and prelate fawn,
And stains the ermine and the lawn!
This makes the nobly born a slave,
And blasts the laurels of the brave!
Drive, goddess, from our isle the pest;
And give the Land and Virtue rest;
Heal the wide wounds which she has made,
More ranc'rous than the Gallic blade;
Then, goddess, guide the hand of pow'r,
As guides th'unerring sun the hour.
Illustrious made by thee alone;
Thy British sons shall then advance
Stronger, with virtue arm'd, than France;
The Caledonian wolves no more
Shall leave th'inhospitable shore,
To prowl in fruitful vales below;
The Brutes shall keep their native den,
Nor taint the social haunts of men.
Majestic in thy candid robe,
Beneath whose soft indulgent care
Religion, like a cherub fair,
To ever-smiling scenes invites,
And not like Superstition frights.
When thou hast wip'd away our stains,
When thou again shalt hold the reins,
Our num'rous fleets the seas shall spread,
Commerce again shall rear her head,
Commerce shall bid Industry bloom,
Employ the distaff and the loom,
She shall again her thousands feed,
And clear the wrincled brow of need.
Refreshment, like cœlestial dews:
Upheld by thee the careful swain
Shall smile beneath the beating rain,
Shall shrink not when the northwinds blow,
Nor shudder in December's snow;
Defys the raging dogstar's heat:
With thee his pleasures all refine,
More rich the flavour of the vine,
A livelyer verdure cloaths the glade,
More pleasing the embow'ring shade:
Thou addest brightness to the day,
And sweetness to the breath of May;
Thou can'st the lover's bliss improve,
Great empress of the god of love.
The noblest ornaments of state,
The Charter Freedom in thy hand,
Thy olive-sceptre of command;
Plenty to thee shall temples raise,
And Science crown thy head with bays;
The Virtues shall attend thy hours,
The Seasons strew thy paths with flow'rs:
To thee the god of verse shall pay
A grateful and melodious lay;
His numbers are deriv'd from thee;
Ill flows the verse that is not free:
The valleys shall the notes prolong,
While the hills echo to the song.
Give me thy never failing aid,
O! ever blessing, ever bless'd,
Pour all thyself into my breast,
Then will I soon an off'ring bring,
Which all thy freeborn sons shall sing,
A tribute to be spread by Fame,
Which shall enlarge thy poet's name,
Shall stretch it to the latest date,
In spite of Envy, spite of Hate,
Shall clear the honour of the times
From uninspir'd, unhallow'd rhymes:
Imagination then shall play
Unbridled in the fields of day,
Thro endless time, and boundless space,
Continue unrestrain'd her race,
Bring what ideas she can find
To the great storehouse of the Mind,
Where Judgement ever sits serene,
To rule the vague and sportive queen.
And Virtue fair majestic dame,
Undoubted offspring from above,
The third from universal Jove,
And present at the rise of man,
Who saw our parent Earth first yield
The various hues which cloath the field
From the green oak's aspiring head
To the blue vi'let's humble bed,
Who saw the Hyades first weep,
And the collection of the deep,
Beheld the early'st dawn of light,
And the first sable veil of night,
Thou who can'st cheerfulness impart
To ev'ry franck and guiltless heart,
O! thou who can'st inspire with ease
The verse that can not fail to please,
Stamp on my song thy mark divine,
O! goddess, consecrate each line,
Strong and mellifluent let them be,
Worthy thy Chesterfield and thee.
One of the names of the Scipios: Cornelius Scipio Africanus Æmilianus was as famous for his learning, and for being the friend and patron of Terence and Polybius, as for his success in war: he rased Carthage and Numantia, and was the adopted grand-son of Cornelius Scipio Africanus Major, who conquered Hannibal, and the son of Paulus Æmilius, who is one of the first characters of antiquity for civil and heroic virtues: and of this distinguished family we may rank the two illustrious Gracchi, who prefered the public good to their own private safety, and fell a sacrifice to the resentment of the senate for asserting the libertys, and defending the propertys of the common people: they were sons of Cornelia the daughter of Scipio Africanus Major. Tiberius Gracchus was, in his public conduct, a man of inflexible virtue and fortitude, and, in his private capacity, of exemplary purity of manners and innocence of life: such is the character which that elegant writer V. Paterculus gives of him.
Tho the Life of Sylla is stained by some vices and levitys which stuck to that great man, yet his military and political conduct have left him without a superior, I believe I may say an equal, on record. His resignation of the dictatorial power, and his restoration to the people of the liberty of electing consuls, deserve an eternal monument of praise. Plutarch, tho an entertaining a very injudicious writer, represents those as acts of cruelty which are only acts of justice; and without which Sylla could never have been able to arrive at the glorious end which he greatly proposed, and happyly accomplished: he only removed the rubbish, which would otherwise have obstructed his passage to the destined goal. He has been branded with the name of tyrant; but if he exercised the power of one, it was only with a view of extirpating tyranny from the land, and to restore liberty to his country. If he who rids the world of one bad man does good to society, he who destroys ten thousand such as are enemys to a well-fixed policy, and to the just libertys of mankind, does a greater good. Virtuous and heroic minds are not shocked at the great effusion of blood, tho they are at the effusion of innocent blood. The sagacious and intrepid Sylla was not actuated by such rules of policy as move inferior souls and ordinary great men: he saw his country in danger of being torn to pieces by faction under the brute Caius Marius, who prided himself in having neither learning nor remorse; and, after subduing the Marian faction, he assumed the power and title of dictator, and thereby became in fact emperor of almost all the known world. Thus vested with almost universal imperial authority, with a larger power than ever a mortal being had before possessed, what greater proof could human nature give of public virtue than by resigning that unlimited power, that he might restore to the people their antient freedom of election of magistrates, and, from the highest elevation of human grandeur, become himself a private man? He that was capable of such a godlike act merits the admiration and applause of the present age, removed almost two thousand years from him, as much as if he now adorned the British throne. This, I think, will stand as an apology for those acts of Sylla which have been the subject of injudicious censure.
| A Hymn to Liberty | |