Ode To Liberty

O liberty! celestial maid!
  Where has thy vagrant fancy stray'd?
  Dost thou from Andes' rifted brow
  See boundless empires spread below,
  See Orellana pour his stream
  Through forests vast, where yet the beam
  Of garish day could never come
  To penetrate the twilight gloom?
  Dost thou thy glowing bosom lave
  In shining Plata's sea-broad wave?
  Or dost thou listen to the roar,
  Where the collected waters pour 
  Their dreadful course, and foaming sweep
  Down Niagara's horrid steep?
  And shall thy form no more be seen
  On Albion's hills and pastures green?
  Wilt thou no more Plinlimmon scale,
  Or sport in Cluyd's fertile dale?
  Wilt thou Ierne's plains forsake,
  And quit Kilarney's lovely lake?
  Shall we thy footsteps trace no more
  On Caledonia's mountains hoar?—
  Ah! nor proud Delphi's rising glade,
  Nor Pisa's consecrated shade,
  Nor Pindus' mount, nor Academe,
  Nor fam'd Eurotas' trophied stream,
  Could for an hour thy steps detain
  When Grecia bow'd to Vice's reign:
  Nor could alas! the softest gale
  That blows o'er rich Campania's vale, 
  Tempt thee to breathe the Latian air
  When Luxury exulted there.
  Far from bright Phœbus' genial light
  Thy wings indignant shaped their flight
  To Scandanavia's frozen plain,
  Eternal Winter's drear domain;
  Where strong with toil each stubborn hord
  Joyful thy holy form ador'd:
  Though, where their tribes the earth o'er-ran,
  Fell desolation led the van,
  Though Horror midst their armies stood,
  And drench'd their fatal paths with blood;
  Yet theirs the unextinguish'd flame
  That glows at Freedom's sacred name,
  Theirs the firm breast that joys to bleed
  For Independence' godlike meed.
  But say, does Albion hapless groan
  Beneath a Tyrant's bloody throne? 
  Say, do her dauntless Patriots feel
  The fatal ax, and torturing wheel?—
  O'er her no cruel Tyrant reigns,
  No patriot blood her scaffold stains.
  'Tis Luxury's insidious hand
  Spreading Corruption through the land;
  'Tis Indolence whose powers controul
  Each nobler purpose of the soul;
  'Tis noisy Faction's selfish aim,
  Disguis'd beneath thy specious name.
  These are the fiends whose fatal rage
  In every clime, and every age,
  Have overturn'd each noble pile
  Rear'd by thy hands with useless toil:
  But where in hardship's rugged school
  Mankind have learn'd themselves to rule,
  Pale Slavery there may shake in vain
  Her iron rod, and galling chain: 
  No force the fearless soul can bind,
  Or bow the unconquerable mind.
  Scorn'd is the Tyrant's harsh decree
  When inborn Virtue bids be free.