Old Swedes' Church
At the brink of the Century greatest—
Eighteenth in the swing of Time—
They built their church, the latest,
When Sweden was in her prime;
Like that in Stockholm city
That the great Gustavus requites,
Where, killed in Lutzen's pity,
He lies among his knights.
Wide arches the whitewashed portal
Beneath the steep-gabled roof,
Like the gate to the Life immortal
Where they enter, armor-proof,
The open cupola tinkles
The bell to the marshes' light,
As the priest of Luther sprinkles
The babes in the parents' sight.
When first the graves were gainer
The dead had been steel-clad men
Who had blended pikes with Baner
And conquered with Torstenssen;
The mad Charles Twelfth they followed
To beat the Russ and the Turk,
And Germany they hollowed
Like a mine-exploded work.
Christine, (not Christiana)
They named the river below
That wafted their jarl'ed hosanna
Almost to the Delaware's flow;
That wilful queen they knew her
Ere Latin her mind could wean,
And they kept their leal unto her
In their queenly fiord, Christeen.
Far came the Goths in union
Within this graveyard gate
To take of the Lord's communion
From Hesselius' royal plate;
The Indian trappers listened
To Campanius in their tongue,
And Acrelius' Annals christened
With the English hymns they sung.
Nine pastors four times builded
A church where yet it stands;
Flashed far the vane they gilded
O'er the glebe and the rolling lands;
Let them who were lush be shriven!
Let them who were sober sleep!
Let the giver's cup be forgiven
Where ivies and myrtles creep!
Ere Nature's priests were ours
These pastors led Swedish men,
Ere Linneaus married the flowers
Or Scheele found us oxygen,
Or Swedenborg mysteries seven
Heard sung by his garden bird—
These preached of an Odin's heaven
And Thor in the thunder heard.
Yet back to Valhalla sounded
Swede echoes to Odin and Thor;
The guns of Dahlgren expounded
And Ericsson's Monitor;
Swede men from the West came wheeling
To Freedom's communion
And the Swedes' old church was feeling
The life in our Union!
A little State they gave us
In the world that was rising new—
The tactics of Gustavus
And the statecraft of Richelieu;
If Sweden lost her bantling
Her purpose went not amiss—
She lost the stays and scantling,
But preserved the edifice.
Stand firm! old Gothic witness!
As in Poltowa's day
And speak of the city's fitness
They planted long to stay!
Speak of the Reformation
When the mind of Man went forth,
And the Swede revolved our Nation
Round the pole star in the North!
Eighteenth in the swing of Time—
They built their church, the latest,
When Sweden was in her prime;
Like that in Stockholm city
That the great Gustavus requites,
Where, killed in Lutzen's pity,
He lies among his knights.
Wide arches the whitewashed portal
Beneath the steep-gabled roof,
Like the gate to the Life immortal
Where they enter, armor-proof,
The open cupola tinkles
The bell to the marshes' light,
As the priest of Luther sprinkles
The babes in the parents' sight.
When first the graves were gainer
The dead had been steel-clad men
Who had blended pikes with Baner
And conquered with Torstenssen;
The mad Charles Twelfth they followed
To beat the Russ and the Turk,
And Germany they hollowed
Like a mine-exploded work.
Christine, (not Christiana)
They named the river below
That wafted their jarl'ed hosanna
Almost to the Delaware's flow;
That wilful queen they knew her
Ere Latin her mind could wean,
And they kept their leal unto her
In their queenly fiord, Christeen.
Far came the Goths in union
Within this graveyard gate
To take of the Lord's communion
From Hesselius' royal plate;
The Indian trappers listened
To Campanius in their tongue,
And Acrelius' Annals christened
With the English hymns they sung.
Nine pastors four times builded
A church where yet it stands;
Flashed far the vane they gilded
O'er the glebe and the rolling lands;
Let them who were lush be shriven!
Let them who were sober sleep!
Let the giver's cup be forgiven
Where ivies and myrtles creep!
Ere Nature's priests were ours
These pastors led Swedish men,
Ere Linneaus married the flowers
Or Scheele found us oxygen,
Or Swedenborg mysteries seven
Heard sung by his garden bird—
These preached of an Odin's heaven
And Thor in the thunder heard.
Yet back to Valhalla sounded
Swede echoes to Odin and Thor;
The guns of Dahlgren expounded
And Ericsson's Monitor;
Swede men from the West came wheeling
To Freedom's communion
And the Swedes' old church was feeling
The life in our Union!
A little State they gave us
In the world that was rising new—
The tactics of Gustavus
And the statecraft of Richelieu;
If Sweden lost her bantling
Her purpose went not amiss—
She lost the stays and scantling,
But preserved the edifice.
Stand firm! old Gothic witness!
As in Poltowa's day
And speak of the city's fitness
They planted long to stay!
Speak of the Reformation
When the mind of Man went forth,
And the Swede revolved our Nation
Round the pole star in the North!
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