Fraternity-Testvériség, 1941 (19. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1941-11-01 / 11. szám
TESTVÉRISÉG 15 No, never shall this land forget, ungrateful, coward, cold, The swords that turned our scale against the Brennuses of old, Sneer at all aspirations high and deem a nation’s praise, Glory, and progress best are found in its costermonger ways! Oh, no; our fathers did not sneer; they warmed them in the glow Of Lafayette’s chivalric brain and the pride of Rochambeau! Yet, need we anteeendents none, nor impulse aught beside The proud, sole sense of liberty, our bright first-cause and guide. The Ship that crept the coast along, now breasts the Main afar; Who steers by the little headlands now? WE LOOK TO THE SKY AND STAR! We are not China, cramped and sworn by Confucius and hir lore; Our creed is the Bible and Brotherhood, and our paths on every shore. (1) Arpad was one of the leaders who brought the Magyars down from the Scythian latitudes into Hungary in the year 800 or thereabouts. It was with great propriety, therefore, that he made his appearance on this occasion, to offer a consoling suggestion to the captive Magyar, borne by perverse fortune backward to the ancient neighborhoods of the race. (2) Marseilles — where Kossuth’s request for permission to pass through France was denied. Yes, Champion of the Magyarland, yes, Tribune of all lands — Give high that banner to the breeze! — we’ll hold aloft thy hands. We love thy tone so boldly Greek, thy soul so Roman proud, That hope in exile all unchilled — that heart in thrall unbowed!— For we love thy cause — that deathless cause, which, for uncounted years, Has passed like an Ark of human love o’er a sea of blood and tears! There is a League of Kings and Priests, and their cruel hands have thrust That sacred old Promethean plea down to the bloody dust. But, call the peoples all forlorn, — rouse them to close and form A Holy Alliance of their own for the sunshine and the storm! Their curse is not the tyrant’s strength; but their own weakness still — The disunion, distrust, and jealousy, and the blind distracted will. These be the foes they yet must fell, or ere their tyrants fall; Else each wild, isolated force that breaks the accursed thrall Is hut the fever’s energy — the weakening strength of ire; Is but the gleam of the phosphorus without the glow of the fire; Wearied, relaxed, and credulous, the unfraternal throng Bends to the vanquished power retrieved, and the bloodier stroke of wrong. (1)
