Had sent its rays upon them, as a star
        Beams from the glorious heaven on slaves who sit

       In chains, to lure them where free seraphs are;
        The light it had shed on them made them start

       From their deep lethargy, then look and see
        That they of Freedom’s boon might have a part,

       Their nation glorious as New England be. 
    And then like men they struggled till they won,
    And Freedom’s high-born light shone as a noonday sun. 
        Men gathered there who were men; nobly they

       Had long and faithful fought ’gainst error’s night,
        And now they saw the sunlight of that day

       They long had hoped to see, when truth and right
        Should triumph o’er the world, and all should hold

       This truth self-evident, that fellow-men,
        In God’s own image made, should not be sold

       Nor stalled as cattle in a market-pen. 
    Praises they sang, and thanks they gave to God,
    That he had loosed the chain, and broke the oppressor’s rod. 
        They gazed o’er all the past; their vision’s eye

       Beheld how men in former years had groaned,
        When Hope’s own flame burned dim, and no light nigh

       Shone to disperse the darkness; when enthroned
        Sat boasting Ignorance, and ’neath its sway

       Grim Superstition held its lurid lamp,
        That only darkened the obstructed way

       In which man groped and wandered, till the damp,
    Cold, cheerless gateway of an opening tomb
    Met his extended hand, and sealed his final doom. 
        Perchance one mind, illumined from above,

       Did strive to burst the heavy bonds it wore,
        Pierce through the clouds of error, and, in love

       With its new mission, upward seek to soar. 
        Upon it shone truth’s faintest, feeblest ray;

       It would be free; but tyrants saw and crushed
        Man’s first attempt to cast his chains away,

       The first aspirings of his nature hushed. 
    Thus back from men was Freedom’s genius driven,
    And Slavery’s chains in ten-fold strength were riven. 
        In gazing o’er the past, ’t was this they saw-

       How Evil long had triumphed; but to-day
        Man bowed to nothing but God’s righteous law,

       And Truth maintained its undisputed sway. 
        Right conquered might; and of this they were proud,

       As they beheld all nations drawing near,—­
        Men from all lands, a vast, unnumbered crowd,

       While in their eyes full many a sparkling tear
    Trembled a while, then from its cell did start,
    Witness to the deep joys of an o’erflowing heart. 
        There came up those who’d crouched beneath the lash,