The Pilgrim's Fathers Poem Rhyme Scheme

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ONE righteous word for Law the common will	A
One living truth of Faith God regnant still	A
One primal test of Freedom all combined	B
One sacred Revolution change of mind	B
One trust unfailing for the night and need	C
The tyrant flower shall cast the freedom seed	C
	-
So held they firm the Fathers aye to be	D
From Home to Holland Holland to the sea	D
Pilgrims for manhood in their little ship	E
Hope in each heart and prayer on every lip	E
They could not live by king made codes and creeds	F
They chose the path where every footstep bleeds	F
Protesting not rebelling scorned and banned	G
Through pains and prisons harried from the land	G
Through double exile till at last they stand	G
Apart from all unique unworldly true	H
Selected grain to sow the earth anew	H
A winnowed part a saving remnant they	I
Dreamers who work adventurers who pray	I
What vision led them Can we test their prayers	J
Who knows they saw no empire in the West	K
The later Puritans sought land and gold	L
And all the treasures that the Spaniard told	L
What line divides the Pilgrims from the rest	K
	-
We know them by the exile that was theirs	J
Their justice faith and fortitude attest	K
And those long years in Holland when their band	G
Sought humble living in a stranger's land	G
They saw their England covered with a weed	C
Of flaunting lordship both in court and creed	C
With helpless hands they watched the error grow	M
Pride on the top and impotence below	M
Indulgent nobles privileged and strong	N
A haughty crew to whom all rights belong	N
The bishops arrogant the courts impure	O
The rich conspirators against the poor	P
The peasant scorned the artisan despised	Q
The all supporting workers lowest prized	Q
They marked those evils deepen year by year	R
The pensions grow the freeholds disappear	R
Till England meant but monarch prelate peer	R
At last the Conquest Now they know the word	S
The Saxon tenant and the Norman lord	T
No longer Merrie England now it meant	U
The payers and the takers of the rent	U
And rent exacted not from lands alone	V
All rights and hopes must centre in the throne	V
Law tithes for prayer their souls were not their own	V
	-
Then o'er the brim the bitter waters welled	U
The mind protested and the soul rebelled	U
And yet how deep the bowl how slight the flow	M
A few brave exiles from their country go	M
A few strong souls whose rich affections cling	W
Though cursed by clerics hunted by the king	W
Their last sad vision on the Grimsby strand	U
Their wives and children kneeling on the sand	U
	-
Then twelve slow years in Holland changing years	X
Strange ways of life strange voices in their ears	X
The growing children learning foreign speech	Y
And growing too within the heart of each	Y
A thought of further exile of a home	Z
In some far land a home for life and death	A2
By their hands built in equity and faith	B2
	-
And then the preparation the heart beat	U
Of wayfarers who may not rest their feet	U
Their Pastor's blessing the farewells of some	C2
'Who stayed in Leyden Then the sea's wide blue	H
'They sailed ' writ one ' and as they sailed they knew	H
That they were Pilgrims '	-
	-
On the wintry main	D2
Grod flings their lives as farmers scatter grain	D2
His breath propels the winged seed afloat	U
His tempests swerve to spare the fragile boat	U
Before His prompting terrors disappear	R
He points the way while patient seamen steer	R
Till port is reached nor North nor South but HERE	E2
	-
Here where the shore was rugged as the waves	F2
'Where frozen nature dumb and leafless lay	I
And no rich meadows bade the Pilgrims stay	I
'Was spread the symbol of the life that saves	F2
To conquer first the outer things to make	G2
Their own advantage unallied unbound	U
Their blood the mortar building from the ground	U
Their cares the statutes making all anew	H
To learn to trust the many not the few	H
To bend the mind to discipline to break	G2
The bonds of old convention and forget	U
The claims and barriers of class to face	H2
A desert land a strange and hostile race	H2
And conquer both to friendship by the debt	U
That Nature pays to justice love and toil	I2
	-
Here on this rock and on this sterile soil	I2
Began the kingdom not of kings but men	J2
Began the making of the world again	J2
Here centuries sank and from the hither brink	K2
A new world reached and raised an old world link	K2
When English hands by wider vision taught	U
Threw down the feudal bars the Normans brought	U
And here revived in spite of sword and stake	G2
Their ancient freedom of the Wapentake	G2
Here struck the seed the Pilgrims' roofless town	L2
Where equal rights and equal bonds were set	U
Where all the people equal franchised met	U
Where doom was writ of privilege and crown	L2
Where human breath blew all the idols down	L2
Where crests were nought where vulture flags were furled	U
And common men began to own the world	U
	-
All praise to others of the vanguard then	J2
To Spain to France to Baltimore and Penn	J2
To Jesuit Quaker Puritan and Priest	U
Their toil be crowned their honors be increased	U
We slight no true devotion steal no fame	M2
From other shrines to gild the Pilgrims' name	M2
As time selects we judge their treasures heaped	U
Their deep foundations laid their harvests reaped	U
Their primal mode of liberty their rules	N2
Of civil right their churches courts and schools	N2
Their freedom's very secret here laid down	L2
The spring of government is the little town	L2
They knew that streams must follow to a spring	G2
And no stream flows from township to a king	G2
Give praise to others early come or late	U
For love and labor on our ship of state	U
But this must stand above all fame and zeal	O2
The Pilgrim Fathers laid the ribs and keel	O2
On their strong lines we base our social health	P2
The man the home the town the commonwealth	P2
	-
Unconscious builders Yea the conscious fail	Q2
Design is impotent if Nature frown	L2
No deathless pile has grown from intellect	U
Immortal things have God for architect	U
And men are but the granite He lays down	L2
Unconscious Yea They thought it might avail	Q2
To build a gloomy creed about their lives	R2
To shut out all dissent but naught survives	S2
Of their poor structure and we know to day	U
Their mission was less pastoral than lay	U
More Nation seed than Gospel seed were they	U
	-
The Faith was theirs the time had other needs	F
The salt they bore must sweeten worldly deeds	F
There was a meaning in the very wind	U
That blew them here so few so poor so strong	G2
To grapple concrete work not abstract wrong	G2
Their saintly Robinson was left behind	U
To teach by gentle memory to shame	M2
The bigot spirit and the word of flame	M2
To write dear mercy in the Pilgrims' law	T2
To lead to that wide faith his soul foresaw	T2
That no rejected race in darkness delves	U2
There are no Gentiles but they make themselves	U2
That men are one of blood and one of spirit	U
That one is as the whole and all inherit	U
	-
On all the story of a life or race	H2
The blessing of a good man leaves its trace	H2
Their Pastor's word at Leyden here sufficed	U
'But follow me as I have followed Christ '	-
And 'I believe there is more truth to come '	-
O gentle soul what future age shall sum	C2
The sweet incentive of thy tender word	U
Thy sigh to hear of conquest by the sword	U
'How happy to convert and not to slay '	-
When valiant Standish killed the chief at bay	U
To such as thee the Fathers owe their fame	M2
The Nation owes a temple to thy name	M2
Thy teaching made the Pilgrims kindly free	D
All that the later Puritans should be	D
Thy pious instinct marks their destiny	D
Thy love won more than force or arts adroit	U
It writ and kept the deed with Massasoit	U
It earned the welcome Samoset expressed	U
It lived again in Eliot's loving breast	U
It filled the Compact which the Pilgrims signed	U
Immortal scroll the first where men combined	U
From one deep lake of common blood to draw	T2
All rulers rights and potencies of law	T2
	-
When waves of ages have their motive spent	U
Thy sermon preaches in this Monument	U
Where Virtue Cour	O

John Boyle O'reilly

The Pilgrim's Fathers Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis

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