"'So help me, God!' my heart at every turn
Of life's wide wilderness implores Thee still
To give all good, to rescue from all ill,
And grant me grace Thy presence to discern.
"'So help me, God!' I would not move a yard
Without my hand in Thine to be my guide,
Thy love to bless, Thy bounty to provide,
Thy fostering wing spread over me to guard.
"'So help me, God!' the motto of my life,
In every varied phase of chance and change,
So that nought happens here of sad or strange
But 'peace' is written on each frown of strife.
"For Thou dost help the man that honoureth Thee!
Ay, and Thy Christian-Israel of this land
That hitherto hath recognised Thy hand,
How blest above the nations still are we!
"Yet now our Senate schemes to spurn aside
(On false pretence of liberal brotherhood)
The Heavenly Father of our earthly good,
Because one atheist hath his God denied!
"What, shall this wrong be done? Must all of us
Groan under coming judgment for the sin
Of welcoming avowed blasphemers in
To vote with rulers who misgovern thus?
"So help us, God! it shall not: England's might
Stands in religion practised and profest;
For so alone by blessing is she blest,
Christian and Protestant in life and light."
To gratify an eminent friend who wished not to exclude Jews and Mahometans from an open profession of godliness as they viewed the question, I altered, in subsequent reprints, the last line, "Christian and Protestant in life and light," to "Loving and fearing God in faith and light:" though personally my sturdy Orangeism inclined to the original. I will in this place give a remarkable extract in a letter to me from Gladstone, to whom my faithfulness had appealed, exhorting him, as I often have done, to be on the right side: we know how he quoted Lucretius on the wrong: against which I wrote a strong protest in the Times. I like not to show private letters,—but this is manifestly a public one. He says: ... "I thank you for your note, and I can assure you that I believe the promoters of the Affirmation Bill to be already on the side you wish me to take, and its opponents to be engaged in doing (unwittingly) serious injury to religious belief." It is strange to see how much intellectual subtlety combined with interested partisanship can be self-deceived, even in a man who believes himself and is thought by others thoroughly conscientious.
Amongst other of my recent notorious ballads of the polemic sort, I ought to name a famous couple—"The Nun's Appeal," and "Open the Convents"—which were written at the request of Lord Alfred Churchill, and given to Edith O'Gorman, the Escaped Nun (otherwise the excellent and eloquent Mrs. Auffray), to aid her Protestant Lectures everywhere: she has circulated them over the three kingdoms, and is now doing the like in Australia and New Zealand.
In reply to some excellent members of the Romish Church, who have publicly accused me of maligning holy women and sacred retreats, my obvious answer is that I contend against the evil side both of nunneries and monkeries, whilst I may fairly admit some good to be found in both. My real protest is for liberty both to mind and body, and against coercion of any kind, material or spiritual. Given perfect freedom, I would not meddle with any one's honest convictions: "to a nunnery go" if thou wilt; only let the resolve be revocable, not a doom for ever.