POEMS
COMPOSED OR SUGGESTED DURING A TOUR IN THE SUMMER OF 1833
POEMS
HERE on their knees men swore: the stones were black, Black in the people’s minds and words, yet they Were at that time, as now, in colour grey. But what is colour, if upon the rack Of conscience souls are placed by deeds that lack Concord with oaths? What differ night and day Then, when before the Perjured on his way Hell opens, and the heavens in vengeance crack Above his head uplifted in vain prayer To Saint, or Fiend, or to the Godhead whom 10 He had insulted–Peasant, King, or Thane? Fly where the culprit may, guilt meets a doom; And, from invisible worlds at need laid bare, Come links for social order’s awful chain.