Wide through the world while genius unconfined
Tempts loftier flights and opens all the mind,
Dissolves the slavish bands of monkish lore,
Wakes the bold arts and bids the Muses soar.
Then shall thy northern climes their seats display,
United nations there commence their sway;
O’er earth and ocean spread their peerless fame
And send through time thy patriarchal name.
Now turn thy view to Europe; see the rage
Of feudal faction every court engage;
All honest labor, all commercial ties
Their kings discountenance, their lords despise.
The naked harbors looking to the main,
Rear their kind cliffs and break the storms in vain,
The willing wave no foreign treasures lade,
Nor sails nor cities cast a watery shade;
Save, where yon opening gulf the strand divides,
Proud Venice bathes her in the broken tides,
Weds her tamed sea, shakes every distant throne
And deems by right the naval world her own.
Yet must we mark, the bondage of the mind
Spreads deeper glooms and subjugates mankind;
The zealots fierce, whom local creeds enrage,
In holy feuds perpetual combat wage,
Support all crimes by full indulgence given,
Usurp the power and wield the sword of heaven.
But lo, where future years their scenes unroll,
The rising arts inspire the venturous soul.
From all the ports that cleave the coast of Spain,
New fleets ascending streak the western main;
From Tago’s bank, from Albion’s rocky round,
Commercing squadrons o’er the billows bound;
Through Afric’s isles observe the sweeping sails,
Full pinions tossing in Arabian gales,
Indus and Ganges deep in canvass lost
And navies crowding round Cambodia’s coast;
New nations rise, all climes and oceans brave
And shade with sheets the immeasurable wave.
See lofty Ximenes with solemn gait
Move from the cloister to the walks of state,
And through the factious monarchies of Spain
Curb the fierce lords and fix one royal reign.
Behold dread Charles the imperial seat ascends,
O’er Europe’s thrones his conquering arm extends;
While wealthier shores beneath the western day
Unfold their treasures to confirm his sway.
Roused at false glory’s fascinating call,
See Francis train the gallant youths of Gaul,
O’erstrain the strength of her extended states,
Scale the proud Alps or burst their granite gates,
On Pavia’s plain for Caesar’s crown contend,
Of arms the votary but of arts the friend.
And see proud Wolsey rise, securely great,
Kings at his call and mitres round him wait;
From monkish walls the hoarded wealth he draws
To aid the tyrant and restrain the laws,
Wakes Albion’s genius, neighboring princes braves
And shares with them the commonwealth of waves,
Behold dark Solyman from eastern skies
With his grim host magnificently rise,
Wave his broad crescent o’er the midland sea,
Through vast Hungaria drive his conquering way,
Crowd close the christian powers and carry far
The rules of homicide, the lore of war.
The Tuscan dukes excite a nobler strife;
Lorenzo calls the Fine Arts forth to life,
Fair nature’s mimic maids; whose powers divine
Her charms develop and her laws define;
From sire to son the splendid labors spread,
And Leo follows where good Cosmo led.
Waked from the ground that Gothic rovers trod
Starts the bronze hero and the marble god;
Monks, prelates, pontiffs pay the reverence due
To that bold taste their Grecian masters knew;
Resurgent temples throng the Latian shore,
The pencil triumphs and the Muses soar.
O’er the dark world Erasmus rears his eye,
In schoolman lore sees kings and nations lie,
With strength of judgment and with fancy warm
Derides their follies and dissolves the charm,
Tears the deep veil that bigot zeal has thrown
On pagan books and science long unknown,
From faith in senseless rites relieves mankind
And seats bold virtue in the conscious mind.
But still the frightful task, to face alone
The jealous vengeance of the papal throne,
Restrains his hand; he gives the contest o’er
And leaves his hardier sons to curb that power.
Luther walks forth in yon majestic frame,
Bright beam of heaven, and heir of endless fame,
Born like thyself through toils and griefs to wind,
From slavery’s chains to free the captive mind,
Brave adverse crowns, control the pontiff sway
And bring benighted nations into day.
Remark what crowds his name around him brings,
Schools, synods, prelates, potentates and kings,
All gaining knowledge from his boundless store,
And join’d to shield him from the papal power.
First of his friends31 see Frederic’s princely form
Ward from the sage divine the gathering storm,
In learned Wittenberg secure his seat,
High throne of thought, religion’s safe retreat.
There sits Melancthon, mild as morning light,
And feuds, though sacred, soften in his sight;
In terms so gentle flows his tuneful tongue,
Even cloister’d bigots join the pupil throng;
By all sectarian chiefs he lives approved,
By monarchs courted32 and by men beloved.
And lo, where Europe’s utmost limits bend,
From this new source what various lights ascend!
See haughty Henry, from the papal tie
His realms dissever, and the priest defy;
While Albion’s sons disdain a foreign throne
And learn to bound the oppressions of their own.
Then rises Loyola, a strange new name,
By paths unseen to reach the goal of fame;
Through courts and camps he teaches how to wind,
To mine whole states and overreach mankind.
Train’d in his school, a bold and artful race
Range o’er the world and every sect embrace,
All creeds and powers and policies explore,
New seats of science raise on every shore;
Till their wide empire gains a wondrous birth,
Built in all empires o’er this ancient earth.
Our wildmen too, the tribes of Paraguay,
Receive their rites and bow beneath their sway.
The world of men thus moving in thy view
Improve their state, more useful works pursue;
Unwonted deeds in rival greatness shine,
Call’d into life, and first inspired by thine.
So while imperial Homer tunes the lyre,
His living lays unnumber’d bards inspire;
From age to age the kindling spirit flies,
Sounds through the earth and echoes to the skies.
Now roll the years, when Europe’s ample space
By peace and culture rears a wiser race,
Men bred to labor, school’d in freedom’s lore
And formed to colonize our favorite shore.
To speed their course, the sons of bigot rage
In persecution whelm the inquiring age;
Myriads of martyr’d heroes mount the pyre,
And blind devotion lights the sacred fire.
Led by the dark Dominicans of Spain,
A newborn Fury walks the wide domain,
Gaunt Inquisition; mark her giant stride,
Her blood-nursed vulture screaming at her side.
Her priestly train the tools of torment brings.
Racks, wheels and crosses, faggots, stakes and strings;
Scaffolds and cages round her altar stand,
And, tipt with sulphur, waves her flaming brand.
Her imps of inquest round the fiend advance,
Suspectors grave and spies with eye askance,
Pretended
