Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

John Greenleaf Whittier (1807–1892). The Poetical Works in Four Volumes. 1892.

Songs of Labor and Reform

The Prisoners of Naples

I HAVE been thinking of the victims bound

In Naples, dying for the lack of air

And sunshine, in their close, damp cells of pain,

Where hope is not, and innocence in vain

Appeals against the torture and the chain!

Unfortunates! whose crime it was to share

Our common love of freedom, and to dare,

In its behalf, Rome’s harlot triple-crowned,

And her base pander, the most hateful thing

Who upon Christian or on Pagan ground

Makes vile the old heroic name of king.

O God most merciful! Father just and kind!

Whom man hath bound let thy right hand unbind.

Or, if thy purposes of good behind

Their ills lie hidden, let the sufferers find

Strong consolations; leave them not to doubt

Thy providential care, nor yet without

The hope which all thy attributes inspire,

That not in vain the martyr’s robe of fire

Is worn, nor the sad prisoner’s fretting chain;

Since all who suffer for thy truth send forth,

Electrical, with every throb of pain,

Unquenchable sparks, thy own baptismal rain

Of fire and spirit over all the earth,

Making the dead in slavery live again.

Let this great hope be with them, as they lie

Shut from the light, the greenness, and the sky;

From the cool waters and the pleasant breeze,

The smell of flowers, and shade of summer trees;

Bound with the felon lepers, whom disease

And sins abhorred make loathsome; let them share

Pellico’s faith, Foresti’s strength to bear

Years of unutterable torment, stern and still,

As the chained Titan victor through his will!

Comfort them with thy future; let them see

The day-dawn of Italian liberty;

For that, with all good things, is hid with Thee,

And, perfect in thy thought, awaits its time to be!

I, who have spoken for freedom at the cost

Of some weak friendships, or some paltry prize

Of name or place, and more than I have lost

Have gained in wider reach of sympathies,

And free communion with the good and wise;

May God forbid that I should ever boast

Such easy self-denial, or repine

That the strong pulse of health no more is mine;

That, overworn at noonday, I must yield

To other hands the gleaning of the field;

A tired on-looker through the day’s decline.

For blest beyond deserving still, and knowing

That kindly Providence its care is showing

In the withdrawal as in the bestowing,

Scarcely I dare for more or less to pray.

Beautiful yet for me this autumn day

Melts on its sunset hills; and, far away,

For me the Ocean lifts its solemn psalm,

To me the pine-woods whisper; and for me

Yon river, winding through its vales of calm,

By greenest banks, with asters purple-starred,

And gentian bloom and golden-rod made gay,

Flows down in silent gladness to the sea,

Like a pure spirit to its great reward!

Nor lack I friends, long-tried and near and dear,

Whose love is round me like this atmosphere,

Warm, soft, and golden. For such gifts to me

What shall I render, O my God, to thee?

Let me not dwell upon my lighter share

Of pain and ill that human life must bear;

Save me from selfish pining; let my heart,

Drawn from itself in sympathy, forget

The bitter longings of a vain regret,

The anguish of its own peculiar smart.

Remembering others, as I have to-day,

In their great sorrows, let me live alway

Not for myself alone, but have a part,

Such as a frail and erring spirit may,

In love which is of Thee, and which indeed Thou art!

1851.