their prey! 
    Naught rests to hallow—­burst the ties
      Of life’s sublime and reverent awe;
  Before the Vice the Virtue flies,
        And Universal Crime is Law! 
      Man fears the lion’s kingly tread;
        Man fears the tiger’s fangs of terror;
      And still, the dreadliest of the dread,
        Is Man himself in error! 
      No torch, though lit from Heaven, illumes
        The Blind!—­Why place it in his hands? 
      It lights not him—­it but consumes
        The City and the Land!

  IX

      Rejoice and laud the prospering skies! 
        The kernel bursts its husks—­behold
      From the dull clay the metal rise,
        Pure-shining, as a star of gold! 
          Neck and lip, but as one beam,
          It laughs like a sunbeam. 
  And even the scutcheon, clear-graven, shall tell
  That the art of a master has fashioned the Bell! 
      Come in—­come in,
      My merry men—­we’ll form a ring
      The new-born labor christening;
        And “CONCORD” we will name her! 
      To union may her heart-felt call
        In brother-love attune us all! 
      May she the destined glory win
        For which the master sought to frame her—­
      Aloft—­(all earth’s existence under)
        In blue-pavilioned heaven afar
      To dwell—­the Neighbor of the Thunder,
        The borderer of the Star! 
      Be hers above a voice to raise
        Like those bright hosts in yonder sphere,
      Who, while they move, their Maker praise,
        And lead around the wreathed year! 
      To solemn and eternal things
        We dedicate her lips sublime,
      As hourly, calmly, on she swings,
        Fanned by the fleeting wings of Time! 
      No pulse—­no heart—­no feeling hers! 
        She lends the warning voice to Fate;
      And still companions, while she stirs,
        The changes of the Human State! 
      So may she teach us, as her tone
        But now so mighty, melts away—­
      That earth no life which earth has known
      From the last silence can delay! 
      Slowly now the cords upheave her! 
        From her earth-grave soars the Bell;
      ’Mid the airs of Heaven we leave her! 
        In the Music-Realm to dwell! 
          Up—­upwards—­yet raise—­
          She has risen—­she sways. 
  Fair Bell to our city bode joy and increase,
  And oh, may thy first sound be hallowed to—­PEACE.[15]

* * * * *

THE GERMAN ART (1800)

  By no kind Augustus reared,
  To no Medici endeared,
    German Art arose;
  Fostering glory smil’d not on her,
  Ne’er with kingly smiles to sun her,
    Did her blooms unclose.

  No!  She went, by Monarchs slighted
  Went unhonored, unrequited,
    From high Frederick’s throne;
  Praise and Pride be all the greater,
  That Man’s genius did create her,
    From Man’s worth alone.