Advance! thou must advance or perish now;—­
                            Advance! 
Advance!  Why live with wasted heart and brow?—­
                            Advance! 
Advance! or sink at once into the grave;
Be bravely free or artfully a slave! 
Why fret thy master, if thou must have one? 
                            Advance! 
Advance three steps, the glorious work is done;—­
                            Advance!

The first is courage—­’tis a giant stride!—­
                            Advance! 
With bounding step up Freedom’s rugged side
                            Advance! 
Knowledge will lead thee to the dazzling heights,
tolerance will teach and guard thy brother’s rights. 
Faint not! for thee a pitying Future waits—­
                            Advance! 
Be wise, be just, with will as fixed as Fate’s,—­
                            Advance!

REMONSTRANCE.

Bless the dear old verdant land,
  Brother, wert thou born of it? 
As thy shadow life doth stand,
Twining round its rosy band,
Did an Irish mother’s hand
  Guide thee in the morn of it? 
Did thy father’s soft command
  Teach thee love or scorn of it?

Thou who tread’st its fertile breast,
  Dost thou feel a glow for it? 
Thou, of all its charms possest,
Living on its first and best,
Art thou but a thankless guest,
  Or a traitor foe for it? 
If thou lovest, where the test? 
  Wouldst thou strike a blow for it?

Has the past no goading sting
  That can make thee rouse for it? 
Does thy land’s reviving spring,
Full of buds and blossoming,
Fail to make thy cold heart cling,
  Breathing lover’s vows for it? 
With the circling ocean’s ring
  Thou wert made a spouse for it!

Hast thou kept, as thou shouldst keep,
  Thy affections warm for it,
Letting no cold feeling creep,
Like the ice breath o’er the deep,
Freezing to a stony sleep
  Hopes the heart would form for it—­
Glories that like rainbows weep
  Through the darkening storm for it?

What we seek is Nature’s right—­
  Freedom and the aids of it;—­
Freedom for the mind’s strong flight
Seeking glorious shapes star-bright
Through the world’s intensest night,
  When the sunshine fades of it! 
Truth is one, and so is light,
  Yet how many shades of it!

A mirror every heart doth wear,
  For heavenly shapes to shine in it;
If dim the glass or dark the air,
That Truth, the beautiful and fair,
God’s glorious image, shines not there,
  Or shines with nought divine in it: 
A sightless lion in its lair,
  The darkened soul must pine in it!

Son of this old, down-trodden land,
  Then aid us in the fight for it;
We seek to make it great and grand,
Its shipless bays, its naked strand,
By canvas-swelling breezes fanned. 
  Oh! what a glorious sight for it! 
The past expiring like a brand,
  In morning’s rosy light for it!