Page:Poems on Various Subjects - Coleridge (1796).djvu/172

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152

Thee, Lamb of God! Thee, blameless Prince of Peace!
From all sides rush the thirsty brood of war!190
Austria, and that foul Woman of the North,
The lustful Murd'ress of her wedded Lord!
And he, connatural Mind! whom (in their songs
So bards of elder time had haply feign'd)
Some Fury fondled in her hate to man,195
Bidding her serpent hair in tortuous folds
Lick his young face, and at his mouth imbreathe
Horrible sympathy! And leagued with these
Each petty German Princeling, nurs'd in gore!
Soul-harden'd barterers of human blood! 200
Death's prime Slave-merchants! Scorpion-whips of Fate!
Nor least in savagery of holy zeal,
Apt for the yoke, the race degenerate,
Whom Britain erst had blush'd to call her sons!