Humanity, or the rights of nature, a poem in two books. By the author of sympathy [i.e. S. J. Pratt] |
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| I. |
| II. |
 | Humanity, or the rights of nature, a poem |  |
Lo Persia's tyrant, with unnatural strife
To please a minion robs a child of life,
With savage rage can blind the first-born son,
And partial lift a second to the throne;
When the proud Sopha has consign'd to death
'Tis treason but to beg a parent's breath,
The sentence past, the look that aims to save,
Condemns to equal fate the pitying slave,
Sensual religion aids the tyrants will,
And blood for ever reeks along the steel;
In dire suspence, like Damocles's sword,
By a slight thread hangs life—a tyrant's word,
Imposts and Edict vex the groaning land,
And ev'n the fountain flows but at command.
To please a minion robs a child of life,
With savage rage can blind the first-born son,
And partial lift a second to the throne;
When the proud Sopha has consign'd to death
'Tis treason but to beg a parent's breath,
The sentence past, the look that aims to save,
Condemns to equal fate the pitying slave,
Sensual religion aids the tyrants will,
And blood for ever reeks along the steel;
In dire suspence, like Damocles's sword,
By a slight thread hangs life—a tyrant's word,
Imposts and Edict vex the groaning land,
And ev'n the fountain flows but at command.
| Humanity, or the rights of nature, a poem | |