Fraternity-Testvériség, 1941 (19. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1941-06-01 / 6. szám

18

TESTVÉRISÉG

ODE TO KOSSUTH

I.

Kossuth! thine is the cause of truth anti right,

Thou cans’t hope fervently and fear not: Oppressed nations keep thee in their sight,

And angels stand about thee in their might.

Kings on their ancient thrones shall rot;

But thy good cause still onward, gathering straight, Shall bear thee to thy triumph, till at length Thy country’s freedom and mankind’s shall be United in one common destiny.

II.

The nations claim a hero in their need,

Whose voice can, trumpet-like, proclaim The coming jubilee, and bravely plead The rights of human brotherhood to feed In human hearts one sacred flame.

Armies for spoil and vain ambition’s dreams,

Have passed o’er Alpine heights and ocean streams; When struggling nations call to us afar,

What barriers then should stay the glorius war?

III.

Kossuth! speak out thy heart, and we must hear, For thou the right hast dearly won;

The Hero and the Martyr — thou dost bear Thy strong credentials from a higher sphere —

It were a crime thy plea to shun.

Great representative of human right!

Uttering thy thoughts of power in words of light, Thine is th’ authority which freemen own,

They scorn the tyrant, but yield truth the throne.

IV. ^

Thou com’st not here an imbecile exile,

To seek a home among the free,

Or rest thy “vearied virtue” here awhile Under relenting fortune’s soothing smile:

Thy soul still full of Hungary,

Thou art her hero still; nor can the storm Which shaterred thee destroy thy gallant form: Within our friendly haven thou’lt repair Thy damage, — then once more the battle dare.

V.

But when thou dost one more the battle dare, Obedient to thv country’s call,

And matchest Hungary to Austria there, —

Must then the Russian leave his northern lair,

And on the weaker fiercely fall?

May not a nation struggling for its life Demand, at least, an equal field of strife?

Despot backs despot —woe to the people, woe!

Who, free themselves, no fellow-feeling show.

VI.

Kossuth! thy honest voice hath stern applied To nations as to men the law Which we as men received, as States denied.

The despot and the priest, by thee defied.

In thy bold speech would seek a flaw;

But Christian freeman here will simply read