Metrical tales, and other poems; - Electric Scotland

132 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS.
The fight where Ignorance and Sin
Shall he the foes to fall.
And fellow-men, hy these enchain'd,
In manhood's might shall rise,
Kejoicing in the freedom gained
Through your suhlime emprise.
" God speed ye !
for ye seek to ring
The knell of bigot hate.
And rival sects together bring,
With spirit truly great,
To strive for high and holy ends.
By means without intrigue :
The wise, the good, will he your friends,
"
And God will speed the League !
THE COENY TOE.
INTRODUCTION.
Mesdames, Mesdemoiselles, Messieurs, my Readers, I have "struck
ile ! " My poetical fortune is made. Once upon a time, I had the honour
to submit a sample of my rhyming ware to a certain learned Society.
Two distinguished memhers of the august body remarked on my performances
adversely. The first condemned all poetry. "Wlien Nature
began to arrange her herbs, flowers, plants, trees, &c., in circles, squares,
triangles, pentagons, polygons, and other regular mathematical figures,
then he would believe that pentameters, hexameters, rhyme and rhytlim
were forms of speech natural to man, or worthy of beihg cultivated by
him ; but, for himself, he held it as axiomatic that, if a man had anything
good to say, he said it in prose. If the fervour of his mental