Thoughts
Oh , sacred Freedom! thou that art so fair,
That all, who once have seen thee, love thee ever—
Thou apparition, that hast been so rare
That wise men say thou wert embodied never;
And learned sages, doating on their lore,
Say thou hast been, and never shalt be more.
When Reason—that whate'er it is, must be—
Was tangled in the complex web of life,
And Sin, the fruit of that forbidden tree,
Made human choice an everlasting strife;
Then every Passion, native to the hour,
Claim'd Reason's privilege and Reason's power.
Yet some there are, and some that still have been,
Who feel, and hate, yet cannot cease to feel
The conscious issue of the cause unseen,
The fate that whirls around the restless wheel—
Some to the stars ascribe the inborn evil,
Some to the Gods, and others to the devil,
To live without a living soul
To feel the spirit daily pining,
Sinking beneath the base control
Of mindless chance, itself consigning
To the dull impulse of oppressive time,
To find the guilt without the power of crime.—
Such is the penance, and the meed
Of thoughts that, boasting to be free,
Spurning the dictates of a practic creed,
Are tangled with excess of liberty,
Making themselves sole arbiters of right,
Trampling on hallow'd use with proud delight.
Perchance they roam in Duty's sacred name,
Commission'd to erect the world anew—
All worldly ties, all interests they disclaim,
Sworn votaries of the beautiful and true;
But vainly deem their own device, in sooth,
The very substance of eternal truth.
Their duty still is Duty to deny,
To burst her bonds and cast her cords away:
As some turn rebels for pure loyalty,
And some, to save the soul, the body slay:
If any law they own, that law decrees,
That sovereign right is born of each man's phantasies.
'Twere woe to tell what lamentable wreck
Such dreams may bring upon the public weal,
If once restraint be broken from the neck
Of such as grossly think, and fiercely feel,
In whom the noble parts by Nature lent,
Are sway'd and biass'd from their kindly bent.
Thralls of the world, to whom the world affords
NOhope but only this—to toil for food,
And eat that they may toil—vassals of lords
With slavish minds and tyrant wills endued,
Whose only charity is selfish waste,
Whose brightest honour 'tis, to sin with taste.
The master of a slave is never free,
But still himself the slave of sensual fear:—
Woe to mankind—for ever doom'd to be
The slaves of slaves. The only freedom here
Lives in the spirit that disowns the bands,
And dares refuse imperious Fate's commands.
From age to age, beneath the base control
Of servile time, we drudge in sloth or toil;
If hope of freedom fire the indignant soul,
Then follows terror wild, and bloody spoil—
Mad Revolution, like a headlong flood,
O'erwhelms alike the evil and the good.
That all, who once have seen thee, love thee ever—
Thou apparition, that hast been so rare
That wise men say thou wert embodied never;
And learned sages, doating on their lore,
Say thou hast been, and never shalt be more.
When Reason—that whate'er it is, must be—
Was tangled in the complex web of life,
And Sin, the fruit of that forbidden tree,
Made human choice an everlasting strife;
Then every Passion, native to the hour,
Claim'd Reason's privilege and Reason's power.
Yet some there are, and some that still have been,
Who feel, and hate, yet cannot cease to feel
The conscious issue of the cause unseen,
The fate that whirls around the restless wheel—
Some to the stars ascribe the inborn evil,
Some to the Gods, and others to the devil,
To live without a living soul
To feel the spirit daily pining,
Sinking beneath the base control
Of mindless chance, itself consigning
To the dull impulse of oppressive time,
To find the guilt without the power of crime.—
Such is the penance, and the meed
Of thoughts that, boasting to be free,
Spurning the dictates of a practic creed,
Are tangled with excess of liberty,
Making themselves sole arbiters of right,
Trampling on hallow'd use with proud delight.
Perchance they roam in Duty's sacred name,
Commission'd to erect the world anew—
All worldly ties, all interests they disclaim,
Sworn votaries of the beautiful and true;
But vainly deem their own device, in sooth,
The very substance of eternal truth.
Their duty still is Duty to deny,
To burst her bonds and cast her cords away:
As some turn rebels for pure loyalty,
And some, to save the soul, the body slay:
If any law they own, that law decrees,
That sovereign right is born of each man's phantasies.
'Twere woe to tell what lamentable wreck
Such dreams may bring upon the public weal,
If once restraint be broken from the neck
Of such as grossly think, and fiercely feel,
In whom the noble parts by Nature lent,
Are sway'd and biass'd from their kindly bent.
Thralls of the world, to whom the world affords
NOhope but only this—to toil for food,
And eat that they may toil—vassals of lords
With slavish minds and tyrant wills endued,
Whose only charity is selfish waste,
Whose brightest honour 'tis, to sin with taste.
The master of a slave is never free,
But still himself the slave of sensual fear:—
Woe to mankind—for ever doom'd to be
The slaves of slaves. The only freedom here
Lives in the spirit that disowns the bands,
And dares refuse imperious Fate's commands.
From age to age, beneath the base control
Of servile time, we drudge in sloth or toil;
If hope of freedom fire the indignant soul,
Then follows terror wild, and bloody spoil—
Mad Revolution, like a headlong flood,
O'erwhelms alike the evil and the good.
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