FOR honest men, of every blood and creed, Let green La Vendee rest a sacred spot; Be all the guilt of Quiberon forgot In the bright memory of its martyr-deed! And let this little book be one more seed, Whence sympathies may spring, encumbered not By circumstance of birth or mortal lot, But claiming virtue's universal meed! And as those two great languages, whose sound Has echoed through the realms of modern time, Feeding with thoughts and sentiments sublime Each other and the listening world around, Meet in these pages as on neutral ground, -- So may their nations' hearts in sweet accord be found! O France and England! on whose lofty crests The day-spring of the Future flows so free, Save where the cloud of your hostility Settles between, and holy light arrests, Shall Ye, first instruments of God's behests, But blunt each other? Shall Barbarians see The two fair sisters of civility Turn a fierce wrath against each other's breasts? No! -- by our common hope and being -- no! By the expanding might and bliss of peace, By the revealed fatuity of war, England and France shall not be foe to foe: For how can earth her store of good increase, If what God loves to make man's passions still will mar? | Discover our Poem Explanations and Poet Analyses!Other Poems of Interest...THE LITTLE DANCERS by LAURENCE BINYON THE LILY, FR. SONGS OF EXPERIENCE by WILLIAM BLAKE ASPATIA'S SONG, FR. THE MAID'S TRAEGDY by JOHN FLETCHER SONNET: FOR INSPIRATION by MICHELANGELO BUONARROTI HYMN ON SOLITUDE by JAMES THOMSON (1700-1748) POSTHUMOUS by HENRY AUGUSTIN BEERS THE EVENING OF THE YEAR by MATHILDE BLIND |