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Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD

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

Songs of Labor and Reform

Astræa

  • “Jove means to settle
  • Astræa in her seat again,
  • And let down from his golden chain
  • An age of better metal.”
  • BEN JONSON, 1615.

    • O POET rare and old!

    Thy words are prophecies;

    Forward the age of gold,

    The new Saturnian lies.

    The universal prayer

    And hope are not in vain;

    Rise, brothers! and prepare

    The way for Saturn’s reign.

    Perish shall all which takes

    From labor’s board and can;

    Perish shall all which makes

    A spaniel of the man!

    Free from its bonds the mind,

    The body from the rod;

    Broken all chains that bind

    The image of our God.

    Just men no longer pine

    Behind their prison-bars;

    Through the rent dungeon shine

    The free sun and the stars.

    Earth own, at last, untrod

    By sect, or caste, or clan,

    The fatherhood of God,

    The brotherhood of man!

    Fraud fail, craft perish, forth

    The money-changers driven,

    And God’s will done on earth,

    As now in heaven!

    1852.


    Contents -BIBLIOGRAPHIC RECORD