The Horoscope

The Horoscope

Thro' centuries enslaved,

They wore its heavy yoke:

No arm for freedom braved,

No warning prophet spoke.

Content to boil their evil day
Beneath the tyrant's iron sway.

Where is the promised aid

To Jacob's offspring given?

Hath God, the Father, made

Of brass the very heaven,

That prayers and sighs shall not ascend,
And Egypt's bondage never end?

The prowess of whose arm

Shall free the million'd throng?

Whose potent voice shall charm

As with a Syren song—

And wake the nation into birth
Ground in their bondage down to earth?

None, none appear to claim

This meed of high emprise,

No hero's mighty name

Is shouted to the skies!

Who then shall free the downcast race
Whose souls are Slavery's dwelling place?

Look to yon wide deep stream,

Of Egypt's wealth the source,

Where sails of commerce gleam,

And mighty stores go forth

To buy the world a chain of gold
That shall the captives ever hold.

Yet on its banks of [?]dge,

Hid in a bulrush ark,

Just in the ripple's edge

Floats in the shadows dark

The law-proscribed enfebled child
Awaiting death—but death is foiled.

Sleep, gentle infant, sleep!

Thy sister's tearful eye

At distance still may weep,

But know the hour is nigh

When thou shalt lead in triumph those
Who tamely now obey their foes.

Jehovah is not man

That he should ever lie;

Tho' men may fail to scan

The signs that mark the sky,

Yet God's dark wrath is gaining strength,
And Egypt shall be crush'd at length.

Crush'd, not by human power,

Crushed, not by warriors proud.

The storms that o'er her lower,

The treasured thunders, loud

Shall burst—but from a hand divine.
Perchance a song—it may be thine

Shall kindle to a blaze

The feel of his wrath,

And its hot scorching rays,

Shall burn an open path—

Till God's own door, all men shall see
Is opened—and THE WORLD IS FREE!

Talk not of mighty names,

Arrayed on Freedom's side;

The battle's fire and flames

Will not the fight decide—

Some feeble unexplored nook,
Is where prophetic eyes must look!

There, there is THE UNKNOWN,

Still hidden from our sight,—

Yet Slavery's darken'd throne,

Its millions, and its might,

Shall quail to him, "The Little Stone"
Its grand commision shall be shown.

As Moses gain'd his name

Drawn from the watery deep,

So from the battle's flame

Shall a deliverer leap,

To mock the sway of human pride,
And o'er our highest princes ride.

Unattributed

1:9, p. 1

9.28.1861