By traitors driven to ruin's brink
Fair Freedom dreads united knaves,
The world must fall if she must bleed;—
And yet, by heaven! I'm proud to think
The world was ne'er subdued by slaves—
Nor shall the hireling herd succeed.
Boy! fill the generous goblet high;
Success to France, shall be the toast:
The fall of kings the fates foredoom,
The crown decays, its' splendours die;
And they, who were a nation's boast,
Sink, and expire in endless gloom.
Thou, stranger, from a distant shore,[A]
Where fetter'd men their rights avow,
Why on this joyous day so sad?
Louis insults with chains no more,—
Then why thus wear a clouded brow,
When every manly heart is glad?
[A] Addressed to the Aristocrats from Hispaniola.—Freneau's note.
Some passing days and rolling years
May see the wrath of kings display'd,
Their wars to prop the tarnish'd crown;
But orphans' groans, and widows' tears,
And justice lifts her shining blade
To bring the tottering bauble down.
[1792]
[54] This was published in the National Gazette, July 14, 1792, introduced as follows:
"Odes on Various Subjects.
"HE who does not read in the book of the Odes, is like a man standing with his face flat against a wall: he can neither move forward, nor stir an inch backward.—
Hau Kiou Choaan."
This was Ode I of the series. It was republished only in the edition of 1795, the text of which I have followed.