O, 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 rights 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 see'st 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 on Syria's mount

Thrilled, warmed, by turns, the listener's heart,

In holy words which cannot die,

In thoughts which angels leaned to know,
Proclaimed thy message from on high-
Thy mission to a world of woe.

That voice's echo hath not died!
From the blue lake of Galilee,
And Tabor's lonely mountain side,
It calls a struggling world to thee.

Thy name and watchword o'er this land
I hear in every breeze that stirs
And round a thousand altars stand
Thy banded party worshippers.

Not to these altars of a day,

At party's call, my gift I bring; But on thy olden shrine I lay

A freeman's dearest offering:—

The voiceless utterance of his will

His pledge to Freedom and to Truth, That manhood's heart remembers still The homage of his generous youth. Election Day, 1843.

TO RONGE.

STRIKE home, strong-hearted man! Down to the root

Of old oppression sink the Saxon steel.

Thy work is to hew down. In God's name then
Put nerve into thy task. Let other men

Plant, as they may, that better tree, whose fruit
The wounded bosom of the Church shall heal.
Be thou the image-breaker. Let thy blows
Fall heavy as the Suabian's iron hand,
On crown or crosier, which shall interpose
Between thee and the weal of Father-land.
Leave creeds to closet idlers. First of all,
Shake thou all German dream-land with the fall
Of that accursed tree, whose evil trunk
Was spared of old by Erfurt's stalwart monk.
Fight not with ghosts and shadows. Let us hear
The snap of chain-links. Let our gladdened ear
Catch the pale prisoner's welcome, as the light
Follows thy axe-stroke, through his cell of night.
Be faithful to both worlds; nor think to feed
Earth's starving millions with the husks of creed.
Servant of Him whose mission high and holy
Was to the wronged, the sorrowing, and the lowly,
Thrust not his Eden promise from our sphere,
Distant and dim beyond the blue sky's span;
Like him of Patmos, see it, now and here,-
The New Jerusalem comes down to man !
Be warned by Luther's error.
Nor like him,
When the roused Teuton dashes from his limb
The rusted chain of ages, help to bind

His hands, for whom thou claim'st the freedom of the mind!

CHALKLEY HALL.39

How bland and sweet the greeting of this breeze To him who flies

From crowded street and red wall's weary gleam, Till far behind him like a hideous dream

The close dark city lies!

Here, while the market murmurs, while men throng
The marble floor

Of Mammon's altar, from the crush and din
Of the world's madness let me gather in
My better thoughts once more.

Oh! once again revive, while on my ear
The cry of Gain

And low hoarse hum of Traffic die away,
Ye blessed memories of my early day
Like sere grass wet with rain!—

Once more let God's green earth and sunset air
Old feelings waken;

Through weary years of toil and strife and ill,
Oh, let me feel that my good angel still
Hath not his trust forsaken.

And well do time and place befit my

Beneath the arms

mood:

Of this embracing wood, a good man made
His home, like Abraham resting in the shade
Of Mamre's lonely palms.

Here, rich with autumn gifts of countless years,
The virgin soil

Turned from the share he guided, and in rain
And summer sunshine throve the fruits and gram
Which blessed his honest toil.

Here, from his voyages on the stormy seas,
Weary and worn,

He came to meet his children and to bless
The Giver of all good in thankfulness
And praise for his return.

And here his neighbors gathered in to greet
Their friend again,

Safe from the wave and the destroying gales,
Which reap untimely green Bermuda's vales,
And vex the Carib main.

To hear the good man tell of simple truth,
Sown in an hour

Of weakness in some far-off Indian isle,
From the parched bosom of a barren soil,
Raised up in life and power:

How at those gatherings in Barbadian vales,
A tendering love

Came o'er him, like the gentle rain from heaven,
And words of fitness to his lips were given,
And strength as from above:

How the sad captive listened to the Word,
Until his chain

Grew lighter, and his wounded spirit felt
The healing balm of consolation melt
Upon its life-long pain :

How the armed warrior sate him down to hear
Of Peace and Truth,

And the proud ruler and his Creole dame,
Jewelled and gorgeous in her beauty came,
And fair and bright-eyed youth.

Oh, far away beneath New England's sky,
Even when a boy,

Following my plough by Merrimack's green shore,