True and Brave

Who is brave but he whose flag
     Flung aloft is never furled?
Who assailed by Slander’s hag
     Stakes his fame against the world?
Who’s a coward but the man,
     Knowing what is just & true,
Shuns it to escape the wan
     Of the hydra monster’s crew?

He who honors the Divine
     Templed in a human breast,
Where the heart becomes a shrine
     Sacred to the Holiest,—
This is he the timid trust
     When the hail & lightning fall,
And expressions thunder-gust
     Threaten Freedom’s palace wall.

He is Virtue’s armed knight
     Fearless in the stormy din,
Where the moral heroes smite
    Open wrong & secret aim.
He defends the widows’ cause.
     Him the toiling children bless:
With the shield of equal laws
     He protects the fatherless.

Though his speech be sweet & low
     To the outcast, wronged & poor,
Every accent is a blow
     Scourging well the evil-doer
Birds unclean & beasts of prey
     Scream & howl in their domain
When he comes to clear the way
     That the Lord of Life may reign.

Ills of storied wont-&-use, 
     Wrongs of immemorial date,
Hoary grown & crowned abuse,
     In his courage meet their fate.
Every pure & lively flower
     In the garden of the soul
Feels his tenderness & power
     And gros sweet in his control.

We have seen an aspirant strong
     Hungering after civic sway,
Quail before a sceptered wrong
     In our country’s evil day;
But this man in virtue mailed
     We have never seen retreat;
Though the hordes of hell assailed
     Heaven predestined their defeat!