John Greenleaf Whittier (1807–1892). The Poetical Works in Four Volumes. 1892.
Anti-Slavery PoemsIn the Evil Days
T
Are made a prey;
Bar up the hospitable door,
Put out the fire-lights, point no more
The wanderer’s way.
Which binds our States
Is melted at her hearth in twain,
Is rusted by her tears’ soft rain:
Close up her gates.
By voice below,
Or bell of kine, or wing of bird,
A beggar’s crust, a kindly word
May overthrow!
Our blood and name;
Bursting its century-bolted frost,
Each gray cairn on the Northman’s coast
Cries out for shame!
The prairie free,
The desert hillside, cavern-rent,
The Pawnee’s lodge, the Arab’s tent,
The Bushman’s tree!
Or soft divan,
Better the rough rock, bleak and bare,
Or hollow tree, which man may share
With suffering man.
Let Love be dumb;
Clasping her liberal hands in awe,
Let sweet-lipped Charity withdraw
From hearth and home.”
Are thine to feed;
Turn not the outcast from thy door,
Nor give to bonds and wrong once more
Whom God hath freed.”
No choice remains;
Yet not untrue to man’s decree,
Though spurning its rewards, is he
Who bears its pains.
And threatening word;
I read the lesson of the Past,
That firm endurance wins at last
More than the sword.
So calm and strong!
Lend strength to weakness, teach us how
The sleepless eyes of God look through
This night of wrong!