Spirit of Freemen, Wake
Air—America.
Spirit of Freemen, wake;
No truce with Slavery make,
Thy deadly foe;
In fair disguises dressed,
Too long hast thou caress’d
The serpent in thy breast,
Now lay him low.
Must e’en the press be dumb?
Must truth itself succumb?
And thoughts be mute?
Shall law be set aside,
The right of prayer denied,
Nature and God decried,
And man called brute?
What lover of her fame
Feels not his country’s shame,
In this dark hour?
Where are the patriots now,
Of honest heart and brow,
Who scorn the neck to bow
To Slavery’s power?
Sons of the Free! we call
On you, in field and hall,
To rise as one;
Your heaven-born rights maintain,
Nor let Oppression’s chain
On human limbs remain;—
Speak! and ’t is done.