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And this place our forefathers made for man!
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This is the process of our love and wisdom,
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To each poor brother who offends against us--
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Most innocent, perhaps--and what if guilty?
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Is this the only cure? Merciful God?
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Each pore and natural outlet shrivell'd up
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By ignorance and parching poverty,
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His energies roll back upon his heart,
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And stagnate and corrupt; till changed to poison,
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They break out on him, like a loathsome plague-spot;
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Then we call in our pamper'd mountebanks--
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And this is their best cure! uncomforted
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And friendless solitude, groaning and tears,
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And savage faces, at the clanking hour,
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Seen through the steams and vapour of his dungeon,
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By the lamp's dismal twilight! So he lies
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Circled with evil, till his very soul
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Unmoulds its essence, hopelessly deformed
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By sights of ever more deformity!
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With other ministrations thou, O nature!
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Healest thy wandering and distempered child:
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Thou pourest on him thy soft influences,
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Thy sunny hues, fair forms, and breathing sweets,
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Thy melodies of woods, and winds, and waters,
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Till he relent, and can no more endure
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To be a jarring and a dissonant thing,
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Amid this general dance and minstrelsy;
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But, bursting into tears, wins back his way,
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His angry spirit healed and harmonized
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