xml/lby.00038.xml Icons of Liberty: "The Liberty Bell"

John Pierpont, "The Liberty Bell," Liberty Bell (1842)

Transcribed from pages 1-5 of the Liberty Bell, for the year 1842.

The Liberty Bell—The Liberty Bell,
The tocsin of Freedom and Slavery's knell
That a whole long year has idle hung,
Again is waggin its clamorous tongue!
As it merrily swings,
Its notes it flings
On the dreamy ear of the planters and kings,
And it gives them a token,
Of manacles broken;—
And all that the prophets of Freedom have spoken.
With tongues of flame,
(Like those which came
On the men who first spoke the Saviour's name,)
Comes over their soul
As death-bells knowl,
Or the wheels of coming thunder roll!
Our Liberty Bell—
They know it well,
The tocsin of Freedom and Slavery's knell!

Our Liberty Bell! let its startling tone
Abroad o'er a slavish land be thrown!
Nay, on the wings of the North-East wind,
Let it reach the isles of the Western Ind—
Those isles of the sun
Where the work is done
That, here at the North, is but just begun.
Let the Bell be swung,
Till old and young,
That dwell New England's hills among,
Shall wake at the peal,
And, with holy zeal,
Beside their mountain altars kneel,
And pray that the yoke
From the necks may be broke
Of the millions who feel the "continual stroke"
Of the despot's rod;
And that Earth's green sod
No more by the foot of a slave may be trod.

Let the Liberty Bell ring out—ring out!
And let freedom reply with a thundering shout,
That the gory scourges and clanking chains,
That blast the beauty of Southern plains,
Shall be stamped in the dust;—
And that thrice-gorged Lust,
That gloats on his helpless bond-slave's bust,
Ere long shall see
That slave set free,
And joining in Liberty's Jubilee.
That Jubilee song!
"O Lord, how long"
Must the world yet wait for that Jubilee song?
Yet, come it must;
Jehovah is just,
And his Truth and his Spirit we cheerfully trust.
That truth to tell
Comes the Liberty Bell,
And that spirit shall make it strike Slavery's knell.

Our Liberty Bell! let its solemn chime
Fall on the ear of hoary Time,
As onward—onward to its goal
He sees the chariot of Liberty roll;
While, with shout and song,
The swelling throng
Of the friends of the bondman urge it along.
Let the same chime fall
On the ears of all,
Who tread on the neck of the negro thrall,
Till they start from the ground,
As they will at the sound
When the trumpets of angels are pealing around.
And the murdered slave
Comes forth from his grave,
And smiles at the flash of th'Avenger's glaive,
And the world shall accord
In the righteous award
To both tyrant and slave, in that day of the Lord.

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