WHY I AM A LIBERAL

ROBERT BROWNING

"Why?" Because all I haply can and do, All that I am now, all I hope to be,Whence comes it save from fortune setting free

Body and soul the purpose to pursue,
God traced for both? If fetters, not a few,
Of prejudice, convention, fall from me,
These shall I bid men-each in his degree
Also God-guided-bear, and gayly too?

But little do or can the best of us: That little is achieved thro' Liberty.

Who then dares hold, emancipated thus, His fellow shall continue bound? not I, Who live, love, labor freely, nor discuss A brother's right to freedom. That is "Why."

THE LOST LEADER

ROBERT BROWNING

Just for a handful of silver he left us,
Just for a riband to stick in his coat-
Found the one gift of which fortune
bereft us,

Lost all the others she lets us devote; They, with the gold to give, doled him out. silver,

So much was theirs who so little allowed: How all our copper had gone for his service! Rags were they purple, his heart had been proud!

We that had loved him so, followed him, honored him,

Lived in his mild and magnificent eye,

Learned his great language, caught his clear accents,

Made him our pattern to live and to die! Shakespeare was of us, Milton was for us, Burns, Shelley, were with us, they watch from their graves!

He alone breaks from the van and the freemen,

-He alone sinks to the rear and the slaves!

We shall march prospering,—not through his presence;

Songs may inspirit us,-not from his lyre; Deeds will be done,-while he boasts his quiescence,

Still bidding crouch whom the rest bade aspire:

Blot out his name, then, record one lost soul

more,

One task more declined, one more footpath untrod,

One more devils'-triumph and sorrow for angels,

One wrong more to man, one more insult to God!

Life's night begins: let him never come back to us!

There would be doubt, hesitation, and pain,

Forced praise on our part-the glimmer of twilight,

Never glad, confident morning again! Best fight on well, for we taught him—strike gallantly,

Menace our heart ere we master his own; Then let him receive the new knowledge and wait us,

Pardoned in heaven, the first by the throne!

Mourn, for to us he seems the last,
Remembering all his greatness in the past,
No more in soldier fashion will he greet
With lifted hand the gazer in the street.
O friends, our chief state-oracle is mute!
Mourn for the man of long-enduring blood,
The statesman-warrior, moderate, resolute,
Whole in himself, a common good.
Mourn for the man of amplest influence,
Yet clearest of ambitious crime,
Our greatest yet with least pretence,
Great in council and great in war,
Foremost captain of his time,
Rich in saving common-sense,
And, as the greatest only are,
In his simplicity sublime.

O good gray head which all men knew,

O voice from which their omens all men drew,

O iron nerve to true occasion true,

O fallen at length that tower of strength

Which stood four-square to all the winds that blew!

Such was he whom we deplore.

The long self-sacrifice of life is o'er.
The great World-victor's victor will be seen

no more.

V

All is over and done,
Render thanks to the Giver,
England, for thy son.

Let the bell be toll'd.
Render thanks to the Giver,
And render him to the mold.
Under the cross of gold

That shines over city and river,
There he shall rest forever
Among the wise and the bold.
Let the bell be toll'd,

And a reverent people behold

The towering car, the sable steeds. Bright let it be with its blazon'd deeds,

Dark in its funeral fold.

Let the bell be toll'd,

And a deeper knell in the heart be knoll'd; And the sound of the sorrowing anthem roll'd

Thro' the dome of the golden cross;

And the volleying cannon thunder his loss;
He knew their voices of old.

For many a time in many a clime
His captain's-ear has heard them boom
Bellowing victory, bellowing doom.
When he with those deep voices wrought,
Guarding realms and kings from shame,
With those deep voices our dead captain
taught

The tyrant, and asserts his claim

In that dread sound to the great name
Which he has worn so pure of blame,
In praise and in dispraise the same,
A man of well-attemper'd frame.
O civic muse, to such a name,
To such a name for ages long,

Was great by land as thou by sea.
Thine island loves thee well, thou famous

man,

The greatest sailor since our world began.
Now, to the roll of muffled drums,

To thee the greatest soldier comes;
For this is he

Was great by land as thou by sea.

His foes were thine; he kept us free;
O, give him welcome, this is he
Worthy of our gorgeous rites,
And worthy to be laid by thee;
For this is England's greatest son,
He that gain'd a hundred fights,
Nor ever lost an English gun;
This is he that far away
Against the myriads of Assaye
Clash'd with his fiery few and won;
And underneath another sun,
Warring on a later day,
Round affrighted Lisbon drew
The treble works, the vast designs
Of his labor'd rampart-lines,
Where he greatly stood at bay,
Whence he issued forth anew,
And ever great and greater grew,
Beating from the wasted vines
Back to France her banded swarms,
Back to France with countless blows,
Till o'er the hills her eagles flew
Beyond the Pyrenean pines,
Follow'd up in valley and glen
With blare of bugle, clamor of men,
Roll of cannon and clash of arms,
And England pouring on her foes,
Such a war had such a close.
Again their ravening eagle rose

In anger, wheel'd on Europe-shadowing wings,

And barking for the thrones of kings;
Till one that sought but Duty's iron crown
On that loud Sabbath shook the spoiler

down;

A day of onsets of despair!
Dash'd on every rocky square,

Their surging charges foam'd themselves

away;

Last, the Prussian trumpet blew;
Thro' the long-tormented air

Heaven flash'd a sudden jubilant ray,

And down we swept and charged and overthrew.

So great a soldier taught us there
What long-enduring hearts could do
In that world-earthquake, Waterloo!
Mighty Seaman, tender and true,

And pure as he from taint of craven guile,