Labor and Reform, vol 3, part 5

Project Gutenberg EBook, Songs of Labor and Reform, by Whittier
Volume III., The Works of Whittier: Anti-Slavery, Labor and Reform
#24 in our series by John Greenleaf Whittier
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Title: Songs of Labor and Reform
From Volume III., The Works of Whittier: Anti-Slavery Poems and
Songs of Labor and Reform
Author: John Greenleaf Whittier
Release Date: December 2005 [EBook #9579]
[Yes, we are more
than one year ahead of schedule]
[This file was first posted on
October 15, 2003]
Edition: 10

Language: English
Character set encoding: ASCII
0. START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, SONGS OF
LABOR AND REFORM ***
This eBook was produced by David Widger [[email protected]
]
ANTI-SLAVERY POEMS
SONGS OF LABOR AND REFORM
BY
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER
SONGS OF LABOR AND REFORM
CONTENTS:
THE QUAKER OF THE OLDEN TIME
DEMOCRACY
THE
GALLOWS
SEED-TIME AND HARVEST
TO THE
REFORMERS OF ENGLAND
THE HUMAN SACRIFICE

SONGS OF LABOR
DEDICATION
THE SHOEMAKERS
THE FISHERMEN

THE LUMBERMEN
THE SHIP-BUILDERS
THE DROVERS

THE HUSKERS
THE REFORMER
THE PEACE
CONVENTION AT BRUSSELS
THE PRISONER FOR DEBT

THE CHRISTIAN TOURISTS
THE MEN OF OLD
TO PIUS
IX.
CALEF IN BOSTON
OUR STATE
THE PRISONERS
OF NAPLES
THE PEACE OF EUROPE
ASTRAEA
THE
DISENTHRALLED
THE POOR VOTER ON ELECTION DAY

THE DREAM OF PIO NONO
THE VOICES
THE NEW
EXODUS
THE CONQUEST OF FINLAND
THE EVE OF
ELECTION
FROM PERUGIA
ITALY
FREEDOM IN

BRAZIL
AFTER ELECTION
DISARMAMENT
THE
PROBLEM
OUR COUNTRY
ON THE BIG HORN
NOTES
THE QUAKER OF THE OLDEN TIME.
THE Quaker of the olden time!
How calm and firm and true,

Unspotted by its wrong and crime,
He walked the dark earth through.

The lust of power, the love of gain,
The thousand lures of sin

Around him, had no power to stain
The purity within.
With that deep insight which detects
All great things in the small,

And knows how each man's life affects
The spiritual life of all,
He
walked by faith and not by sight,
By love and not by law;
The
presence of the wrong or right
He rather felt than saw.
He felt that wrong with wrong partakes,
That nothing stands alone,

That whoso gives the motive, makes
His brother's sin his own.
And,
pausing not for doubtful choice
Of evils great or small,
He listened
to that inward voice
Which called away from all.
O Spirit of that early day,
So pure and strong and true,
Be with us
in the narrow way
Our faithful fathers knew.
Give strength the evil
to forsake,
The cross of Truth to bear,
And love and reverent fear to
make
Our daily lives a prayer!
1838.
DEMOCRACY.
All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even
so to them.--MATTHEW vii. 12.
BEARER of Freedom's holy light,
Breaker of Slavery's chain and rod,

The foe of all which pains the sight,
Or wounds the generous ear of
God!

Beautiful yet thy temples rise,
Though there profaning gifts are
thrown;
And fires unkindled of the skies
Are glaring round thy
altar-stone.
Still sacred, though thy name be breathed
By those whose hearts thy
truth deride;
And garlands, plucked from thee, are wreathed
Around
the haughty brows of Pride.
Oh, ideal of my boyhood's time!
The faith in which my father stood,

Even when the sons of Lust and Crime
Had stained thy peaceful
courts with blood!
Still to those courts my footsteps turn,
For through the mists which
darken there,
I see the flame of Freedom burn,--
The Kebla of the
patriot's prayer!
The generous feeling, pure and warm,
Which owns the right of all
divine;
The pitying heart, the helping arm,
The prompt
self-sacrifice, are thine.
Beneath thy broad, impartial eye,
How fade the lines of caste and
birth!
How equal in their suffering lie
The groaning multitudes of
earth!
Still to a stricken brother true,
Whatever clime hath nurtured him;

As stooped to heal the wounded Jew
The worshipper of Gerizim.
By misery unrepelled, unawed
By pomp or power, thou seest a Man

In prince or peasant, slave or lord,
Pale priest, or swarthy artisan.
Through all disguise, form, place, or name,
Beneath the flaunting
robes of sin,
Through poverty and squalid shame,
Thou lookest on
the man within.
On man, as man, retaining yet,
Howe'er debased, and soiled, and dim,

The crown upon his forehead set,
The immortal gift of God to him.

And there is reverence in thy look;
For that frail form which mortals
wear
The Spirit of the Holiest took,
And veiled His perfect
brightness there.
Not from the shallow babbling fount
Of vain philosophy thou art;

He who of old