11.

O House of Stuart! to thy memory still
For this best benefit

Should British hearts in gratitude be bound.
A deeper tragedy

Than thine unhappy tale hath never filled
The historic page, nor given

Poet or moralist his mournful theme.
O House severely tried,

And in prosperity alone
Found wanting! Time hath closed

Thy tragic story now.

Errors, and virtues fatally betrayed,
Magnanimous suffering, vice,

Weakness, and headstrong zeal, sincere, though blind,
Wrongs, calumnies, heart-wounds,

Religious resignation, earthly hopes,

Fears, and affections, these have had their course,
And over them in peace

The all-ingulfing stream of years hath closed.
But this good work endures;
Stablished and perfected by length of days,
The indissoluble union stands.

12.

Nor hath the sceptre from that line
Departed, though the name hath lost
Its regal honors. Trunk and root have failed:

A scion from the stock

Liveth and flourisheth.

It is the Tree

Beneath whose sacred shade,

In majesty and peaceful power serene, The Island Queen of Ocean hath her seat; Whose branches far and near

Extend their sure protection; whose strong roots Are with the Isle's foundations interknit; Whose stately summit, when the storm careers Below, abides unmoved,

Safe in the sunshine and the peace of Heaven. KESWICK, 1822.

THE WARNING VOICE.

ODE I.

1.

TAKE up thy prophecy,

Thou dweller in the mountains, who hast nursed
Thy soul in solitude,

Holding communion with immortal minds,
Poets and sages of the days of old,
And with the sacred food

Of meditation and of lore divine
Hast fed thy heavenly part;
Take up thy monitory strain,
O son of song, a strain severe
Of warning and of woe!

2.

O Britain, O my Mother Isle,
Ocean's imperial Queen,

Thou glory of all lands!

Is there a curse upon thee, that thy sons
Would rush to ruin, drunk

With sin, and in infuriate folly blind?
Hath Hell enlarged itself,

And are the Fiends let loose
To work thine overthrow?

3.

For who is she

That, on the many-headed Beast
Triumphantly enthroned,

Doth ride abroad in state,

The Book of her Enchantments in her hand?
Her robes are stained with blood,
And on her brazen front

Is written BLASPHEMY.

4.

Know ye not, then, the Harlot? - know ye not Her shameless forehead, her obdurate eye, Her meretricious mien,

Her loose, immodest garb, with slaughter foul?
Your Fathers knew her, when delirious France,
Drunk with her witcheries,

Upon the desecrated altar set
The Sorceress, and, with rites

Inhuman and accursed,

O'er all the groaning land
Performed her sacrifice.

5.

Your Fathers knew her, when the nations round
Received her maddening spell,

And called her Liberty,
And in that name proclaimed
A jubilee for guilt;

When their blaspheming host defied high Heaven,
And wheresoe'er they went let havoc loose;
Your Fathers knew the Sorceress! They stood firm,
And, in that hour of trial faithful found,
They raised the Red-Cross flag.

6.

They knew her; and they knew

That not in scenes of rapine and of blood,
In lawless riotry,

And wallowing with the multitude obscene,
Would Liberty be found!

Her in her form divine,

Her genuine form, they knew:
For Britain was her home;

With Order and Religion there she dwelt;

It was her chosen seat,

Her own beloved Isle.

Think not that Liberty

From Order and Religion e'er will dwell

Apart; companions they
Of heavenly seed connate.

7.

Woe, woe for Britain, woe!
If that society divine,

By lewd and impious uproar driven,
Indignantly should leave

The land that in their presence hath been blest!
Woe, woe! for in her streets

Should gray-haired Polity

Be trampled under foot by ruffian force,
And Murder to the noonday sky

Lift his red hands, as if no God were there,
War would lay waste the realm;

Devouring fire consume

Temples and Palaces;

Nor would the lowliest cot

Escape that indiscriminating storm, When Heaven upon the guilty nation poured The vials of its wrath.

8.

These are no doubtful ills!

The unerring voice of Time

Warns us that what hath been again shall be; And the broad beacon-flame

Of History casts its light

Upon Futurity.