Upton Sinclair, ed. (1878–1968).
The Cry for Justice: An Anthology of the Literature of Social Protest. 1915. | | | | Slavery |
By William Cowper |
(English poet, 1731–1800) |
| | | O FOR a lodge in some vast wilderness, | |
| Some boundless contiguity of shade, | |
| Where rumor of oppression and deceit, | |
| Of unsuccessful or successful war, | |
| Might never reach me more. My ear is pained, | 5 |
| My soul is sick, with every day’s report | |
| Of wrong and outrage with which earth is filled. | |
| There is no flesh in man’s obdurate heart, | |
| It does not feel for man; the natural bond | |
| Of brotherhood is severed as the flax | 10 |
| That falls asunder at the touch of fire. | |
| He finds his fellow guilty of a skin | |
| Not colored like his own; and having power | |
| To enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause | |
| Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey. | 15 |
| Lands intersected by a narrow frith | |
| Abhor each other. Mountains interposed | |
| Make enemies of nations, who had else | |
| Like kindred drops been mingled into one. | |
| Thus man devotes his brother, and destroys; | 20 |
| And, worse than all, and most to be deplored, | |
| As human nature’s broadest, foulest blot, | |
| Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts his sweat | |
| With stripes, that Mercy, with a bleeding heart, | |
| Weeps when she sees inflicted on a beast. | 25 | | | |
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