CHORUS:
Breathe low, low
The spell of the mighty mistress now!
When Conscience lulls her sated snake,
And Tyrants sleep, let Freedom wake. _30
Breathe low—low
The words which, like secret fire, shall flow
Through the veins of the frozen earth—low, low!
SEMICHORUS 1:
Life may change, but it may fly not;
Hope may vanish, but can die not; _35
Truth be veiled, but still it burneth;
Love repulsed,—but it returneth!
SEMICHORUS 2:
Yet were life a charnel where
Hope lay coffined with Despair;
Yet were truth a sacred lie, _40
Love were lust—
SEMICHORUS 1:
If Liberty
Lent not life its soul of light,
Hope its iris of delight,
Truth its prophet’s robe to wear,
Love its power to give and bear. _45
CHORUS:
In the great morning of the world,
The Spirit of God with might unfurled
The flag of Freedom over Chaos,
And all its banded anarchs fled,
Like vultures frighted from Imaus, _50
Before an earthquake’s tread.—
So from Time’s tempestuous dawn
Freedom’s splendour burst and shone:—
Thermopylae and Marathon
Caught like mountains beacon-lighted, _55
The springing Fire.—The winged glory
On Philippi half-alighted,
Like an eagle on a promontory.
Its unwearied wings could fan
The quenchless ashes of Milan. _60
From age to age, from man to man,
It lived; and lit from land to land
Florence, Albion, Switzerland.
Then night fell; and, as from night,
Reassuming fiery flight, _65
From the West swift Freedom came,
Against the course of Heaven and doom.
A second sun arrayed in flame,
To burn, to kindle, to illume.
From far Atlantis its young beams _70
Chased the shadows and the dreams.
France, with all her sanguine steams,
Hid, but quenched it not; again
Through clouds its shafts of glory rain
From utmost Germany to Spain. _75
As an eagle fed with morning
Scorns the embattled tempest’s warning,
When she seeks her aerie hanging
In the mountain-cedar’s hair,
And her brood expect the clanging _80
Of her wings through the wild air,
Sick with famine:—Freedom, so
To what of Greece remaineth now
Returns; her hoary ruins glow
Like Orient mountains lost in day; _85
Beneath the safety of her wings
Her renovated nurslings prey,
And in the naked lightenings
Of truth they purge their dazzled eyes.
Let Freedom leave—where’er she flies, _90
A Desert, or a Paradise:
Let the beautiful and the brave
Share her glory, or a grave.
NOTES: _77 tempest’s]tempests edition 1822. _87 prey edition 1822; play editions 1839.
SEMICHORUS 1:
With the gifts of gladness
Greece did thy cradle strew; _95
SEMICHORUS 2:
With the tears of sadness
Greece did thy shroud bedew!
SEMICHORUS 1:
With an orphan’s affection
She followed thy bier through Time;