IRELAND.
49
We can never unite—thank God for that! in such unity as yours,
That strangles the rights of others, and only itself endures
As the guard of a bloodstained spoil and the red-eyed watch of the slave;
No need for such robber-union to a race free-souled and brave.
The races that band for plunder are the mud of the human stream.
The base and the coward and sordid, without an unselfish gleam.
It is mud that unites; but the sand is free—ay, every grain is free.
And the freedom of individual men is the highest of liberty.
It is mud that coheres; but the sand is free, till the lightning smite the shore.
And smelt the grains to a crystal mass, to return to sand no more.
