XXVIII.

"O God Almighty! thou alone hast power! Who can resist thy will? who can restrain Thy wrath, when on the guilty thou dost shower

The shafts of thy revenge, a blistering rain? Greatest and best, be merciful again!

Have we not stabbed thine enemies, and made

The Earth an altar, and the Heavens a fane, Where thou wert worshipped with their blood, and laid

Those hearts in dust which would thy searchless works have weighed?

XXIX.

"Well didst thou loosen on this impious City

Thine angels of revenge : recall them now; Thy worshippers abased here kneel for pity, And bind their souls by an immortal vow: We swear by thee! and to our oath do thou Give sanction, from thine hell of fiends and flame,

That we will kill with fire and torments slow, The last of those who mocked thy holy

name,

And scorned the sacred laws thy prophets did proclaim."

XXX.

Thus they with trembling limbs and pallid lips Worshipped their own hearts' image, dim and vast,

Scared by the shade wherewith they would. eclipse

The light of other minds;-troubled they passed

From the great Temple;-fiercely still and fast

The arrows of the plague among them fell, And they on one another gazed aghast,

And through the hosts contention wild befell, As each of his own god the wondrous works did tell.

XXXI.

And Oromaze, and Christ, and Mahomet, Moses, and Buddh, Zerdusht, and Brahm, and Foh,

A tumult of strange names, which never met
Before, as watchwords of a single woe,
Arose; each raging votary 'gan to throw
Aloft his armèd hands, and each did howl
"Our God alone is God!" and slaughter

now

Would have gone forth, when from beneath a cowl

A voice came forth, which pierced like ice through every soul.

XXXII.

He was a Christian Priest from whom it came,

A zealous man, who led the legioned west With words which faith and pride had steeped in flame,

To quell the rebel Atheists; a dire guest Even to his friends was he, for in his breast Did hate and guile lie watchful, intertwined, Twin serpents in one deep and winding nest; He loathed all faith beside his own, and

To wreak his fear of God in vengeance on

mankind.

XXXIII.

But more he loathed and hated the clear

light

Of wisdom and free thought, and more did fear,

Lest, kindled once, its beams might pierce the night,

Even where his Idol stood; for far and near Did many a heart in Europe leap to hear That faith and tyranny were trampled down; Many a pale victim, doomed for truth to share

The murderer's cell, or see, with helpless

groan,

The Priests his children drag for slaves to serve their own.

XXXIV.

He dared not kill the infidels with fire
Or steel, in Europe: the slow agonies
Of legal torture mocked his keen desire:
So he made truce with those who did despise
His cradled Idol, and the sacrifice

Of God to God's own wrath,-that Islam's creed

Might crush for him those deadlier enemies; For fear of God did in his bosom breed A jealous hate of man, an unreposing need.

XXXV.

"Peace! Peace!" he cried, "when we are dead, the Day

Of Judgment comes, and all shall surely know Whose God is God; each fearfully shall pay

The errors of his faith in endless woe! But there is sent a mortal vengeance now On earth, because an impious race had spurned Him whom we all adore,-a subtile foe By whom for ye this dread reward was earned, And thrones, which rest on faith in God, nigh overturned.

XXXVI.

"Think ye, because ye weep, and kneel, and

pray,

That God will lull the pestilence? it rose Even from beneath his throne, where many a day

repose:

His mercy soothed it to a dark
It walks upon the earth to judge his foes;
And what are thou and I, that he should deign
To curb his ghastly minister, or close

The gates of death, ere they receive the twain Who shook with mortal spells his undefended reign ?

66

XXXVII.

'Aye, there is famine in the gulph of hell,
Its giant worms of fire for ever yawn,
Their lurid eyes are on us! those who fell
By the swift shafts of pestilence ere dawn
Are in their jaws! they hunger for the spawn
Of Satan, their own brethren, who were sent
To make our souls their spoil. See! See!
they fawn

Like dogs, and they will sleep with luxury spent,

When those detested hearts their iron fangs have rent!

XXXVIII.

"Our God may then lull Pestilence to sleep:

Pile high the pyre of expiation now!
A forest's spoil of boughs, and on the heap
Pour venomous gums, which sullenly and
slow,

When touched by flame, shall burn, and melt, and flow,

A stream of clinging fire, and fix on high A net of iron, and spread forth below A couch of snakes, and scorpions, and the fry Of centipedes and worms, earth's hellish progeny !

XXXIX.

“Let Laon and Laone on that pyre, Linked tight with burning brass, perish!

then pray

That, with this sacrifice, the withering ire
Of God may be appeased."

A

they

He ceased, and

space stood silent, as far, far away The echoes of his voice among them died; And he knelt down upon the dust, alway Muttering the curses of his speechless pride, Whilst shame, and fear, and awe, the armies did divide.

XL.

His voice was like a blast that burst the portal

Of fabled hell; and as he spake, each one Saw gape beneath the chasms of fire immortal, And Heaven above seemed cloven, where, on a throne

With storms and shadows girt, sate God, alone,

Their King and Judge-fear killed in every breast