Labor and Reform, vol 3, part 5 | Page 3

blast?The ventures of thy seed we cast,?And trust to warmer sun and rain?To swell the germs and fill the grain.
Who calls thy glorious service hard??Who deems it not its own reward??Who, for its trials, counts it less.?A cause of praise and thankfulness?
It may not be our lot to wield?The sickle in the ripened field;?Nor ours to hear, on summer eves,?The reaper's song among the sheaves.
Yet where our duty's task is wrought?In unison with God's great thought,?The near and future blend in one,?And whatsoe'er is willed, is done!
And ours the grateful service whence?Comes day by day the recompense;?The hope, the trust, the purpose stayed,?The fountain and the noonday shade.
And were this life the utmost span,?The only end and aim of man,?Better the toil of fields like these?Than waking dream and slothful ease.
But life, though falling like our grain,?Like that revives and springs again;?And, early called, how blest are they?Who wait in heaven their harvest-day!?1843.
TO THE REFORMERS OF ENGLAND.?This poem was addressed to those who like Richard Cobden and John Bright were seeking the reform of political evils in Great Britain by peaceful and Christian means. It will be remembered that the Anti-Corn Law League was in the midst of its labors at this time.
GOD bless ye, brothers! in the fight?Ye 're waging now, ye cannot fail,?For better is your sense of right?Than king-craft's triple mail.
Than tyrant's law, or bigot's ban,?More mighty is your simplest word;?The free heart of an honest man?Than crosier or the sword.
Go, let your blinded Church rehearse?The lesson it has learned so well;?It moves not with its prayer or curse?The gates of heaven or hell.
Let the State scaffold rise again;?Did Freedom die when Russell died??Forget ye how the blood of Vane?From earth's green bosom cried?
The great hearts of your olden time?Are beating with you, full and strong;?All holy memories and sublime?And glorious round ye throng.
The bluff, bold men of Runnymede?Are with ye still in times like these;?The shades of England's mighty dead,?Your cloud of witnesses!
The truths ye urge are borne abroad?By every wind and every tide;?The voice of Nature and of God?Speaks out upon your side.
The weapons which your hands have found?Are those which Heaven itself has wrought,?Light, Truth, and Love; your battle-ground?The free, broad field of Thought.
No partial, selfish purpose breaks?The simple beauty of your plan,?Nor lie from throne or altar shakes?Your steady faith in man.
The languid pulse of England starts?And bounds beneath your words of power,?The beating of her million hearts?Is with you at this hour!
O ye who, with undoubting eyes,?Through present cloud and gathering storm,?Behold the span of Freedom's skies,?And sunshine soft and warm;
Press bravely onward! not in vain?Your generous trust in human-kind;?The good which bloodshed could not gain?Your peaceful zeal shall find.
Press on! the triumph shall be won?Of common rights and equal laws,?The glorious dream of Harrington,?And Sidney's good old cause.
Blessing the cotter and the crown,?Sweetening worn Labor's bitter cup;?And, plucking not the highest down,?Lifting the lowest up.
Press on! and we who may not share?The toil or glory of your fight?May ask, at least, in earnest prayer,?God's blessing on the right!?1843.
THE HUMAN SACRIFICE.
Some leading sectarian papers had lately published the letter of a clergyman, giving an account of his attendance upon a criminal (who had committed murder during a fit of intoxication), at the time of his execution, in western New York. The writer describes the agony of the wretched being, his abortive attempts at prayer, his appeal for life, his fear of a violent death; and, after declaring his belief that the poor victim died without hope of salvation, concludes with a warm eulogy upon the gallows, being more than ever convinced of its utility by the awful dread and horror which it inspired.
I.?FAR from his close and noisome cell,?By grassy lane and sunny stream,?Blown clover field and strawberry dell,?And green and meadow freshness, fell?The footsteps of his dream.?Again from careless feet the dew?Of summer's misty morn he shook;?Again with merry heart he threw?His light line in the rippling brook.?Back crowded all his school-day joys;?He urged the ball and quoit again,?And heard the shout of laughing boys?Come ringing down the walnut glen.?Again he felt the western breeze,?With scent of flowers and crisping hay;?And down again through wind-stirred trees?He saw the quivering sunlight play.?An angel in home's vine-hung door,?He saw his sister smile once more;?Once more the truant's brown-locked head?Upon his mother's knees was laid,?And sweetly lulled to slumber there,?With evening's holy hymn and prayer!
II.?He woke. At once on heart and brain?The present Terror rushed again;?Clanked on his limbs the felon's chain?He woke, to hear the church-tower tell?Time's footfall on the conscious bell,?And, shuddering, feel that clanging din?His life's last hour had ushered in;?To see within his prison-yard,?Through the small window, iron barred,?The gallows shadow rising dim?Between the sunrise heaven and him;?A horror in God's blessed air;?A blackness in his morning light;?Like some foul