dots-menu
×

Home  »  An American Anthology, 1787–1900  »  1219 John Bright

Edmund Clarence Stedman, ed. (1833–1908). An American Anthology, 1787–1900. 1900.

By Francis BartonGummere

1219 John Bright

I

FEW men of hero-mould

The Quaker counts amid his ranks to-day;

But, in the troublous times of old,

Before commodity’s loud gold

Drowned with its clank the clash of steel,

The Quaker held no devious way;

For him to see was but to feel,

To feel was but to say.

II

All hail those men of yore!

Amid innumerable disasters true

To that brave standard which they bore;

Whether amid the maddened roar

Of priest-led mobs, or scourged and flung

To die in gaols, or where the few

Sat waiting for the cloven tongue,

But one straight path they knew.

III

Yet peace breeds doubtful virtues. When the flame

Of persecution flickered, fell, expired,

So dimmed the old lustre; no hot shame

The wavering conscience fired.

So, when wild storms are past, and winds grow tame,

And the foiled tempest holds his hand,

The vessels cast safe anchor near the strand;

And sweet it seems a gentle sea to ride,

While lapping waters lave

The weary, battered side:—

“Ah, linger thus,” the shipmen cry, “near land,

Nor tempt again the buffets of the wave!”

They will not heed the voice

That calls from far and chides their choice:

He must not dally with the shore

Who thinks on noble gain,

But bend him stoutly to the oar,

And seek the midmost main,

And wrest their treasure from the clasp of wave and hurricane.

IV

Ho! pilot of the roaring seas!

No summer sailor thou;

It was no idle breeze

That set those manly lines upon thy brow;

For thou hast done what all to do are fain,

Yet few, ah, few attain,—

Hast never struck thy sail

And fled before the gale

Till it had spent its force,—

But sawest clear upon the chart of life

Thy straight-drawn track; and though the storm blew loud,

And elemental strife

In one mad whirl joined sea and cloud,

Thou hast but lashed thy helm and held thy course.

And for the manly heart and manly deed

Thy country loves thee,—gives

Honor unstinted as thy meed;

And they that still can hold

The Quaker name rejoice that one man lives

Who fills the measure of their hero-mould.

V

At glimpse of wrong, thy voice that knows not fear,

As sword from scabbard still hath leapt, and fills

With noblest echoes these wide halls of time.

We too, when tempests shook our western clime,

And all the air was rife with bodings grave,

Have felt new hope to hear

That voice of manly cheer,

And mark the signal of a friendly hand

From yon far strand

Where thy bluff England dashes back the wave.

VI

Brief be our word, yet strong.

So we this greeting send,

Stout English heart, across the severing sea,

Whose chainless waters blend

The breezes of two nations that are free;

Free, free for evermore!

And shore shall call to shore

In sister freedom till the end of time;

And still the thunder chime

Of that vast sea shall chorus the same song.

Ay, he who bends his ear

To those great tones, shall hear

Exultant voices, swelling high, proclaim

That thou, undaunted heart,

Hast played a hero’s part,

Joining with freedom’s deathless song thy deathless name.