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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=420467" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>Cassandra Southwick</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">To the God of all sure mercies let my blessing rise today,<br>From the scoffer and the cruel He hath plucked the spoil away;<br>Yes, he who cooled the furnace around the faithful three,<br>And tamed the Chaldean lions, hath set His handmaid free!</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Last night I saw the sunset melt though my prison bars,<br>Last night across my damp earth-floor fell the pale gleam of stars;<br>In the coldness and the darkness all through the long night-time,<br>My grated casement whitened with autumn's early rime.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Alone, in that dark sorrow, hour after hour crept by;<br>Star after star looked palely in and sank adown the sky;<br>No sound amid night's stillness, save that which seemed to be<br>The dull and heavy beating of the pulses of the sea;</div><div style="margin:10px 0">All night I sat unsleeping, for I knew that on the morrow <br>The ruler said the cruel priest would mock me in my sorrow,<br>Dragged to their place of market, and bargained for and sold,<br>Like a lamb before the shambles, like a heifer from the fold!</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Oh, the weakness of the flesh was there¯the shrinking and the shame;<br>And the low voice of the Tempter like whispers to me came,<br>'Why sit'st thou thus forlornly,' the wicked murmur said,<br>'Damp walls thy bower beauty, cold earth thy maiden bed?</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Where be the smiling faces, and voices soft and sweet, <br>Seen in thy father's dwelling, hoard in the pleasant street?<br>Where be the youths whose glances, the summer Sabbath through, <br>Turned tenderly and timidly unto thy father's pew?</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Why sit'st thou here, Cassandra? Bethink thee with what mirth <br>Thy happy schoolmates gather around the warm, dark hearth; <br>How the crimson shadows tremble on foreheads white and fair,<br>On eyes of merry girlhood, half hid in golden hair.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Not for thee the hearth-fire brightens, not for thee kind words are spoken,<br>Not for thee the nuts of Wenham woods by laughing boys are broken;<br>No first-fruits of the orchard within thy lap are laid,<br>For thee no flowers of autumn the youthful hunters braid.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'O weak, deluded maiden!¯by crazy fancies led,<br>With wild and raving railers an evil path to tread;<br>To leave a wholesome worship, and teaching pure and sound,<br>And mate with maniac women, loose-haired and sackcloth-bound,</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'And scoffers of the priesthood, who mock at things divine, <br>Who rail against thy pulpit, and holy bread and wine;<br>Bore from their cart-tail scourgings, and from the pillory lame,<br>Rejoicing in their wretchedness, and glorying in their shame.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'And what a fate awaits thee!¯a sadly toiling slave,<br>Dragging the slowly lengthening chain of bondage to the grave!<br>Think of thy woman's nature, subdued in hopeless thrall, <br>The easy prey of any, the scoff and scorn of all!'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Oh, ever as the Tempter spoke, and feecle Nature's fears <br>Wrung drop by drop the scalding flow of unavailing tears,<br>I wrestled down the evil thoughts, and strove in silent prayer<br>To feel, O Helper of the weak! that Thou indeed wert there!</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I thought of Paul and Silas, within Philippi's call,<br>And how from Peter's sleeping limbs the prison shackles fell,<br>Till I seemed to hear the trailing of an Angel's robe of white,<br>And to feel a blessed presence invisible to sight.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Bless the Lord for all his mercies!¯for the peace and love I felt,<br>Like the dew of Hermon's holy hill, upon my spirit melt;<br>When 'Get behind me, Satan! ' was the language of my heart,<br>And I felt the Evil Tempter with all his doubts depart.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Slow broke the gray cold morning; again the sunshine fell,<br>Flocked with the shade of bar and grate within my lonely cell;<br>The hoar-frost melted on the wall, and upward from the street <br>Came careless laugh and idle word, and tread of passing feet.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">At length the heavy bolts fell back, my door was open cast,<br>And slowly at the sheriff's side, up the long street I passed; <br>I heard the murmur round me, and felt, but dared not see,<br>How, from every door and window, the people gazed on me.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And doubt and fear fell on me, shame burned upon my cheek,<br>Swam earth and sky around me, my trembling limbs grew weak;<br>'Oh Lord, support thy handmaid, and from her soul cast out <br>The fear of men, which brings a snare, the weakness and the doubt.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Then the dreary shadows scattered, like a cloud in morning's breeze,<br>And a low deep voice within me seemed whispering words like these:<br>'Though thy earth be as the iron, and thy heaven a brazen wall,<br>Trust still His loving-kindness whose power is over all.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">We paused at length, where at my feet the sunlit waters broke <br>On glaring roach of shining beach, and shingly wall of rock;<br>The merchant-ships lay idle there, in hard clear lines on high,<br>Treeing with rope and slender spar their network on the sky.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And there were ancient citizens, cloak-wrapped and grave and cold,<br>And grim and stout sea-captains with faces bronzed and old,<br>And on his horse, with Rawson, his cruel clerk at hand,<br>Sat dark and haughty Endicott, the ruler of the land.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And poisoning with his evil words the ruler's ready ear,<br>The priest leaned over his saddle, with laugh and scoff and jeer;<br>It stirred my soul, and from my lips the soul of silence broke,<br>As if through woman's weakness a warning spirit spoke.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I cried 'The Lord rebuke thee, thou smiter of the meek, <br>Thou robber of the righteous, thou trampler of the weak!<br>Go light the cold, dark hearth-stones,¯go turn the prison lock<br>Of the poor hearts though hast hunted, thou wolf amid the flock!'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Dark lowered the brows of Endicott, and with a deeper red<br>O'er Rawson's wine-empurpled cheek the flash of anger spread;<br>'Good people, ' quoth the white-lipped priest, 'heed not her words so wild,<br>Her Master speaks within her¯ the Devil owns his child!'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">But gray heads shook, and young brows knit, the while the sheriff read <br>That law the wicked rulers against the poor have made, <br>Who to their house of Rimmon and idol priesthood bring<br>No bonded knee of worship, nor gainful offering.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Then to the stout sea-captains the sheriff, turning, said¯<br>'Wish of ye, worthy seamen, will take this Quaker maid?<br>On the Isle of fair Barbados, or on Virginia's shore<br>You may hold her at a higher price than Indian girl or Moor!'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Grim and silent stood the captains; and when again he cried,<br>'Speak out my worthy seamen!' no voice, no sign replied;<br>But I felt a hard hand press my own, and kind words met my ear,¯<br>'God bless thee, and preserve thee, my gentle girl and dear!' </div><div style="margin:10px 0">A weight seemed lifted from my heart, a pitying friend was nigh, <br>I felt it in his hard, rough hand, and saw it in his eye;<br>And when again the sheriff spoke, that voice, so kind to me,<br>Growled back its stormy answer like the roaring of the sea. </div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Pile my ship with bars of silver, pack with coins of Spanish gold<br>From keel-piece up to deck-plank, the roomage of her hold,<br>By the living God that made me! I would sooner in your bay<br>Sink ship and crew and cargo, than bear this child away!'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Well answered, worthy captain, shame on their cruel laws!'<br>Ran through the crowd in murmurs loud the people's just applause.<br>'Like the herdsmen of Tekoa, In Israel of old,<br>Shall we see the poor and righteous again for silver sold ?'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">I looked on haughty Endicott; with weapon half-way drawn,<br>Swept around the throng his lion glare of bitter hate and scorn;<br>Fiercely he drew his bridle-rain, and turned in silence back,<br>And sneering priest and baffled clerk rode murmuring in his track.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Hard after them the sheriff looked, in bitterness of soul,<br>Thrice smote his staff upon the ground, and crushed his parchment-roll.<br>'Good friends,' he said, 'since both have fled, the ruler and the priest<br>Judge ye, if from their further work I be not well released.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Loud was the cheer which, full and clear, swept round the silent bay,<br>As, with kind words and kinder looks, he bade me go my way;<br>For he who turns the courses of the streamlet of the glen,<br>And the river of great waters, had turned the hearts of men.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Oh, at that hour the very earth seemed changed beneath my eye,<br>A holier wonder round no rose the blue walls of the sky,<br>A lovelier light on rock and hill and stream and woodland lay,<br>And softer lapsed on sunnier sands the waters of the bay.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Thanksgiving to the Lord of life! To him all praises be,<br>Who from the hands of evil men hath set his handmaid free;<br>All praise to Him before whose power the mighty are afraid,<br>Who take the crafty in the snare which for the poor is laid!</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Sing, O my soul, rejoicingly, on evening's twilight calm<br>Uplift the loud thanksgiving, pour forth the grateful psalm;<br>Let all dear hearts with me rejoice, as did the saints of old,<br>When of the Lord's good angel the rescued Peter told.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">And weep and howl, ye evil priests and mighty men of wrong,<br>The lord shall smite the proud, and lay His hand upon the strong.<br>Woe to the wicked rulers in his avenging hour!<br>Woe to the wolves who seek the flocks to raven and devour!</div><div style="margin:10px 0">But let the humble ones arise, the poor in heart be glad,<br>And let the mourning ones again with robes of praise be clad,<br>For he who cooled the furnace, and smoothed the stormy wave,<br>And tamed the Chaldean lions, is mighty still to save!</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=John+Greenleaf+Whittier">John Greenleaf Whittier</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=420467" data-title="Cassandra Southwick de John Greenleaf Whittier" data-description="To the God of all sure mercies let my blessing rise today,
From the scoffer and the cruel He hath plucked the spoil away;
Yes, he who cooled the furnace around the faithful three,
And tamed the Chaldean lions, hath set His handmaid free!

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