Anti-Slavery Poems and Songs of Labor and Reform Part 5

THE MORAL WARFARE.

WHEN Freedom, on her natal day, Within her war-rocked cradle lay, An iron race around her stood, Baptized her infant brow in blood; And, through the storm which round her swept, Their constant ward and watching kept.

Then, where our quiet herds repose, The roar of baleful battle rose, And brethren of a common tongue To mortal strife as tigers sprung, And every gift on Freedom's shrine Was man for beast, and blood for wine!

Our fathers to their graves have gone; Their strife is past, their triumph won; But sterner trials wait the race Which rises in their honored place; A moral warfare with the crime And folly of an evil time.

So let it be. In G.o.d's own might We gird us for the coming fight, And, strong in Him whose cause is ours In conflict with unholy powers, We grasp the weapons He has given,-- The Light, and Truth, and Love of Heaven.

1836.

RITNER.

Written on reading the Message of Governor Ritner, of Pennsylvania, 1836. The fact redounds to the credit and serves to perpetuate the memory of the independent farmer and high-souled statesman, that he alone of all the Governors of the Union in 1836 met the insulting demands and menaces of the South in a manner becoming a freeman and hater of Slavery, in his message to the Legislature of Pennsylvania.

THANK G.o.d for the token! one lip is still free, One spirit untrammelled, unbending one knee!

Like the oak of the mountain, deep-rooted and firm, Erect, when the mult.i.tude bends to the storm; When traitors to Freedom, and Honor, and G.o.d, Are bowed at an Idol polluted with blood; When the recreant North has forgotten her trust, And the lip of her honor is low in the dust,-- Thank G.o.d, that one arm from the shackle has broken!

Thank G.o.d, that one man as a freeman has spoken!

O'er thy crags, Alleghany, a blast has been blown!

Down thy tide, Susquehanna, the murmur has gone!

To the land of the South, of the charter and chain, Of Liberty sweetened with Slavery's pain; Where the cant of Democracy dwells on the lips Of the forgers of fetters, and wielders of whips!

Where "chivalric" honor means really no more Than scourging of women, and robbing the poor!

Where the Moloch of Slavery sitteth on high, And the words which he utters, are--Wors.h.i.+p, or die!

Right onward, oh, speed it! Wherever the blood Of the wronged and the guiltless is crying to G.o.d; Wherever a slave in his fetters is pining; Wherever the lash of the driver is twining; Wherever from kindred, torn rudely apart, Comes the sorrowful wail of the broken of heart; Wherever the shackles of tyranny bind, In silence and darkness, the G.o.d-given mind; There, G.o.d speed it onward! its truth will be felt, The bonds shall be loosened, the iron shall melt.

And oh, will the land where the free soul of Penn Still lingers and breathes over mountain and glen; Will the land where a Benezet's spirit went forth To the peeled and the meted, and outcast of Earth; Where the words of the Charter of Liberty first From the soul of the sage and the patriot burst; Where first for the wronged and the weak of their kind, The Christian and statesman their efforts combined; Will that land of the free and the good wear a chain?

Will the call to the rescue of Freedom be vain?

No, Ritner! her "Friends" at thy warning shall stand Erect for the truth, like their ancestral band; Forgetting the feuds and the strife of past time, Counting coldness injustice, and silence a crime; Turning back front the cavil of creeds, to unite Once again for the poor in defence of the Right; Breasting calmly, but firmly, the full tide of Wrong, Overwhelmed, but not borne on its surges along; Unappalled by the danger, the shame, and the pain, And counting each trial for Truth as their gain!

And that bold-hearted yeomanry, honest and true, Who, haters of fraud, give to labor its due; Whose fathers, of old, sang in concert with thine, On the banks of Swetara, the songs of the Rhine,-- The German-born pilgrims, who first dared to brave The scorn of the proud in the cause of the slave; Will the sons of such men yield the lords of the South One brow for the brand, for the padlock one mouth?

They cater to tyrants? They rivet the chain, Which their fathers smote off, on the negro again?

No, never! one voice, like the sound in the cloud, When the roar of the storm waxes loud and more loud, Wherever the foot of the freeman hath pressed From the Delaware's marge to the Lake of the West, On the South-going breezes shall deepen and grow Till the land it sweeps over shall tremble below!

The voice of a people, uprisen, awake, Pennsylvania's watchword, with Freedom at stake, Thrilling up from each valley, flung down from each height, "Our Country and Liberty! G.o.d for the Right!"

THE PASTORAL LETTER

The General a.s.sociation of Congregational ministers in Ma.s.sachusetts met at Brookfield, June 27, 1837, and issued a Pastoral Letter to the churches under its care. The immediate occasion of it was the profound sensation produced by the recent public lecture in Ma.s.sachusetts by Angelina and Sarah Grimke, two n.o.ble women from South Carolina, who bore their testimony against slavery. The Letter demanded that "the perplexed and agitating subjects which are now common amongst us... should not be forced upon any church as matters for debate, at the hazard of alienation and division," and called attention to the dangers now seeming "to threaten the female character with widespread and permanent injury."

So, this is all,--the utmost reach Of priestly power the mind to fetter!

When laymen think, when women preach, A war of words, a "Pastoral Letter!"

Now, shame upon ye, parish Popes!

Was it thus with those, your predecessors, Who sealed with racks, and fire, and ropes Their loving-kindness to transgressors?

A "Pastoral Letter," grave and dull; Alas! in hoof and horns and features, How different is your Brookfield bull From him who bellows from St. Peter's Your pastoral rights and powers from harm, Think ye, can words alone preserve them?

Your wiser fathers taught the arm And sword of temporal power to serve them.

Oh, glorious days, when Church and State Were wedded by your spiritual fathers!

And on submissive shoulders sat Your Wilsons and your Cotton Mathers.

No vile "itinerant" then could mar The beauty of your tranquil Zion, But at his peril of the scar Of hangman's whip and branding-iron.

Then, wholesome laws relieved the Church Of heretic and mischief-maker, And priest and bailiff joined in search, By turns, of Papist, witch, and Quaker The stocks were at each church's door, The gallows stood on Boston Common, A Papist's ears the pillory bore,-- The gallows-rope, a Quaker woman!

Your fathers dealt not as ye deal With "non-professing" frantic teachers; They bored the tongue with red-hot steel, And flayed the backs of "female preachers."

Old Hampton, had her fields a tongue, And Salem's streets could tell their story, Of fainting woman dragged along, Gashed by the whip accursed and gory!

And will ye ask me, why this taunt Of memories sacred from the scorner?

And why with reckless hand I plant A nettle on the graves ye honor?

Not to reproach New England's dead This record from the past I summon, Of manhood to the scaffold led, And suffering and heroic woman.

No, for yourselves alone, I turn The pages of intolerance over, That, in their spirit, dark and stern, Ye haply may your own discover!

For, if ye claim the "pastoral right"

To silence Freedom's voice of warning, And from your precincts shut the light Of Freedom's day around ye dawning;

If when an earthquake voice of power And signs in earth and heaven are showing That forth, in its appointed hour, The Spirit of the Lord is going And, with that Spirit, Freedom's light On kindred, tongue, and people breaking, Whose slumbering millions, at the sight, In glory and in strength are waking!

When for the sighing of the poor, And for the needy, G.o.d bath risen, And chains are breaking, and a door Is opening for the souls in prison!

If then ye would, with puny hands, Arrest the very work of Heaven, And bind anew the evil bands Which G.o.d's right arm of power hath riven;

What marvel that, in many a mind, Those darker deeds of bigot madness Are closely with your own combined, Yet "less in anger than in sadness"?

What marvel, if the people learn To claim the right of free opinion?

What marvel, if at times they spurn The ancient yoke of your dominion?

A glorious remnant linger yet, Whose lips are wet at Freedom's fountains, The coming of whose welcome feet Is beautiful upon our mountains!

Men, who the gospel tidings bring Of Liberty and Love forever, Whose joy is an abiding spring, Whose peace is as a gentle river!

But ye, who scorn the thrilling tale Of Carolina's high-souled daughters, Which echoes here the mournful wail Of sorrow from Edisto's waters, Close while ye may the public ear, With malice vex, with slander wound them, The pure and good shall throng to hear, And tried and manly hearts surround them.

Oh, ever may the power which led Their way to such a fiery trial, And strengthened womanhood to tread The wine-press of such self-denial, Be round them in an evil land, With wisdom and with strength from Heaven, With Miriam's voice, and Judith's hand, And Deborah's song, for triumph given!

And what are ye who strive with G.o.d Against the ark of His salvation, Moved by the breath of prayer abroad, With blessings for a dying nation?

What, but the stubble and the hay To perish, even as flax consuming, With all that bars His glorious way, Before the brightness of His coming?

And thou, sad Angel, who so long Hast waited for the glorious token, That Earth from all her bonds of wrong To liberty and light has broken,--

Angel of Freedom! soon to thee The sounding trumpet shall be given, And over Earth's full jubilee Shall deeper joy be felt in Heaven!