150
JOAN OF ARC.
A general fast."
Severe the Maid replied:
"Monarch of France! and canst thou think that God
Beholds well-pleas'd the mock'ry of a fast?[1]
Luxuriant lordly riot is content 490
And willingly obedient to command,
Feasts on some sainted dainty. The poor man,
From the hard labor of the day debarr'd,
Loses his hard meal too. It were to waste
The hour in impious folly, so to bribe 496
Severe the Maid replied:
"Monarch of France! and canst thou think that God
Beholds well-pleas'd the mock'ry of a fast?[1]
Luxuriant lordly riot is content 490
And willingly obedient to command,
Feasts on some sainted dainty. The poor man,
From the hard labor of the day debarr'd,
Loses his hard meal too. It were to waste
The hour in impious folly, so to bribe 496
"The
- ↑ Line 489 "If they who mingled the Cup of Bitterness, drank its contents, we might look with compassion on the wickedness of great men: But alas! the storm which they raise, "beats heaviest on the exposed innocent," and the cottage of the poor man is stripped of every comfort, before the Oppressors, who send forth the mandate of death, are amerced of one Luxury, or one Vice. If calamities succeed each other in a long series, they deprecate the anger of Heaven by a Fast; which word (being interpreted) seems to signify—Prayers of Hate to the God of Love, and then a turbot feast to the rich, and their usual scanty meal to the poor, if indeed, debarred from their usual labor, they can procure even this! But if the cause be crowned by victory,———"They o'er the ravaged earth,
As at an altar wet with human blood,
And flaming with the fire of cities burnt,
Sing their mad Hymns of Triumph—Hymns to God,
O'er the destruction of his gracious works,
Hymns to the father o'er his slaughter'd son."See Conciones ad Populum, or, Addresses to the People, by S. T. Coleridge
