O Europe! O America!
If ye but knew this fatal day!
If ye could read the eternal law
Now at the parting of the way!
If ye, beholding thus distressed
This pilgrim, leave him here to die,
Ye are his murderers confessed,
The guilt upon your souls will lie.
T’will follow you through many a year,
Corrupting the sweet tides of life,
Now in insidious blight appear,
And now break forth in horrid strife.
T’will nullify religion’s claims,
T’will mar your literature and art;
T’will choke society’s best aims,
To greed new energy impart.
Nor even so shall ye evade
The dreaded specter of the East;
Until by right or ruin laid
It shall intrude into your feast.
But if ye do the deed of men
And save your brother here half-killed,
Then shall ye be as born again,
Your life with upward impulse filled.
Your better selves once shaken free
Will loath submit to other chains;
And from your deed of charity,
Your own shall be the larger gains.