An Appeal to a Clerical Friend

Thou are a teacher sent from Heaven! ‘Tis well!
Heaven’s vows are on thy soul—and He who gave
Thy dread commission, hath with legible hand
Written his requisitions. Read with fear—
Study their solemn import, with a heart
Willing to know and do, and pray for strength
To meet the dread responsibility.

     Thou are God’s champion for the truth! ‘Tis well!
Stand boldly, then, and in the strength of Him
Who clad thy spirit in the panoply
Heaven gives its warriors, battle manfully
With ancient Falsehood and her horrid brood—
With Fraud and Error, and the legioned Lies
That walk with shameless front through all the earth
And claim it as their own.

                                              Fling to the air
The banners of IMMANUEL! And beneath
Their snowy folds, where blood-stain hath not been
Save of the victor, strike for GOD!—strike home!
And prove thyself no recreant.

                                              Look abroad!
Guilt triumphs in the land, and fearless grown,
Exults in her immunity. Shall Earth,
Formed for thy glory, LORD! henceforth be hers
Without a struggle? Shall its prostrate realms
Bow to her sway, and kiss the bloody rod
She proudly shakes above them? God Forefend!

          Speak! Champion of the Cross! Uplift thy voice
And pour its warning, like a trumpet-tone,
Through all the startled land! To Israel
Reveal her great transgression, and the house
Of Jacob point thou to its crimson sins.
Spare not—for even the Church is stained with guilt,
And on her robes, once white, pollution reeks,
And her skirts drip with blood, while yet she hugs
All foul abominations to her heart!
Justice hath fallen in the street, beneath
The heels of ruffian tramplers—Truth is driven
Forth from the temples of the Living God—
Mercy grows faint with pleading long in vain—
While rampant Murder and unsated Lust,
Bloated Oppression and foul Avarice,
A hateful brotherhood, walk hand in hand;
And the false priest, while hiding in his robe
The price of bartered souls, looks on and smiles!
Cry!—for the good man faileth. Call aloud!
Lift up thy voice for truth and righteousness!
For God and for His Kingdom lift it up!
If thou art dumb, the stones beneath thy feet
Shall have a voice! Earth cannot be thus dumb—
Earth—which hath drunk the blood of Innocence—
Earth—which hath hidden is her breast the slain,
Shall bare her crimson record to Heaven’s eye,
And call aloud for vengeance!

                                              Man of God!
Is this a time for folding of the hands?
A time for sleep?—while darkly in the sky
Retributive judgments gather, such as smote
Egypt in ancient time, till Ruin trod
Sole monarch of the land, and wildly rose
From all her fanes and myriad palaces
A universal wail—a Kingdom’s cry
Of anguish for her multitudinous dead!
Up! ere the coming vengeance overwhelm
The guilty People and the guiltier Priest!—
Up! ere the fiery ruin hurtle down
Upon our country, to consume and waste,
Until, where now is Beauty, Death shall sit
Upon the smouldering ashes of our hopes,
Pointing his bony finger to a scene
Of wo, and desolation, and despair!