Know

4.

ye not then the Harlot! know ye not Her shameless forehead, her obdurate eye,

Her meretricious mien,

Her loose immodest garb with slaughter foul;
Your fathers knew her, when delirious France,
Drunk with her witcheries,
Upon the desecrated altar set
The sorceress, and with rites
Inhuman and accurst,

O'er all the groaning land
Performed her sacrifice!

5.

Your Fathers knew her! when the nations round Received her maddening spell,

And called her Liberty,

And in that name proclaimed

A jubilee for guilt;

When their blaspheming hosts defied high Heaven,
And wheresoe'er they went let havoc loose.
Your fathers knew the Sorceress! they stood firm,
And in that hour of trial faithful found,
They raised the Red-Cross flag.

6.

They knew her, and they knew

That not in scenes of rapine and of blood,
In lawless riotry,

And wallowing with the multitude obscene,
Would Liberty be found!

Her, in her form divine,

Her genuine form, they knew;

For Britain was her home.

With Order and Religion there she dwelt;
It was her chosen seat,

Her own beloved Isle.
Think not that Liberty

From Order and Religion ere will dwell

Apart, companions they,

Of heavenly seed connate.

7.

Woe, woe for Britain, woe!
If that Society divine,

By lewd and impious uproar driven,
Indignantly should leave

The land that in their presence hath been blest!
Woe, woe! for in her streets
Should grey haired Polity

Be trampled under foot by ruffian force;
And Murder to the noon-day sky

Lift his red hands, as if no God were there!
War would lay waste the realm;
Devouring fire consume
Temples and Palaces;

Nor would the lowliest cot,
Escape that indiscriminating storm,
When Heaven upon the guilty nation pour'd
The vials of its wrath.

8.

These are no doubtful ills!

The unerring voice of time

Warns us that what hath been again shall be;
And the broad beacon flame

Of History, casts its light
Upon Futurity.

9.

Turn not thy face away,
Almighty! from the realm

By thee so highly favoured, and so long!
Thou who in war hast been our shield and strength,
From famine who hast saved us, and hast bade
The Earthquake and the Pestilence go by,
Spare us, O Father! save us from ourselves!
From insane Faction, who prepares the pit
In which itself would fall;

From rabid Treason's rage,—
The lurking Atheist's wiles,-

The mad Blasphemer's venom,-from our foes,
Our errors, and our sins,

Save us, O Father! in thy mercy save!

1819.

ODE. II.

1.

In a vision I was seized,

When the elements were hush'd
In the stillness that is felt
Ere the storm goes abroad;
Thro' the air I was borne away:
And in spirit I beheld
Where a city lay beneath,
Like a valley mapp❜d below,
When seen from a mountain top.

2.

The night had closed around,
And o'er the sullen sky

Were the wide wings of Darkness spread,
The City's myriad lamps

Shone mistily below,
Like stars in the bosom of a lake:

And its murmurs arose,

Incessant and deep,

Like the sound of the sea

Where it rakes on a stony shore.

3.

A voice from the darkness went forth,
"Son of Man, look below! "
Mine eyes were opened then,
And the veil which conceals
The Invisible world was withdrawn,

4.

I looked, and behold!

As the Patriarch, in his dream,

Saw the Angels to and fro
Pass from Heaven to Earth,
On their ministry of love;
So saw I where a way
From that great City, led
To the black abyss of bale,
To the dolorous region of Death.

5.

Wide and beaten was the way,

And deep the descent

To the Adamantine Gates,

Which were thrown on their hinges back.
Wailing and Woe were within,
And the gleam of sulphurous fires,
In darkness and smoke involved.

6.

And through those open gates
The fiends were swarming forth:
Hastily, joyfully,
As to a jubilee,

The Spirits accurst were trooping up:
They filled the streets,

And they bore with them curses and plagues,
And they scattered lies abroad,
Horrors, obscenities,
Blasphemies, treasons,

And the seeds of strife and death.

7.

"Son of Man, look up!" said the Voice,
I looked, and beheld

The way which Angels tread,
Seen like a pillar of light

That slants from a broken sky,

That heavenly way by clouds was closed,

Heavy, and thick, and dark, with thunder charged;
And there a Spirit stood,

Who raised in menacing act his awful arm;
He spake aloud, and thrilled

My inmost soul with fear.

8.

"Woe! Woe!

Woe to the City where Faction reigns!
Woe to the Land where Sedition prevails!
Woe to the Nation whom Hell deceives!
Woe! Woe!

They have Eyes and they will not see! They have Ears and they will not hear! They have Hearts and they will not feel! Woe to the People who fasten their eyes! Woe to the People who deafen their ears! Woe to the People who harden their hearts! Woe! Woe!

The Vials are charged,

The measure is full,
The wrath is ripe,-

Woe! Woe!"

9.

But from that City then, behold,
A gracious form arose:

Her snow-white wings upon the dusky air,
Shone like the waves which glow
Around the midnight keel in liquid light.
Upward her supplicating arms were spread,
And as her face to heaven

In eloquent grief she raised,
Loose, like a Comet's refluent tresses, hung
Her heavenly hair dispersed.

10.

"Not yet, O Lord! not yet,
O merciful as just!

Not yet!"-the tutelary Angel cried ;
For I must plead with Thee for this poor land,
Guilty, but still the seat

Of genuine piety,-
The mother still of noble minds,-
The nurse of high desires!
Not yet, O Lord, not yet,
Give thou thine anger way!
Thou who hast set thy Bow
Of Mercy in the cloud,
Not yet, O Lord, pour out
The Vials of thy wrath!