Then, by the hope of your dear children's rights,

Strike! for the power is poised in your right hands !
Now ye must do or die!

Behold the image

Of hero-worship that your fathers knelt to,

(striking)

Worked by these hands! I am great Mœris' son,

Prometheus, of the Titan race!

(Loud and long-continued shouts from the multitude.)

THE PEOPLE.

He lives,

The son of Moeris !-liberty or death!
Down with the tyrant!-on to Memphis!

EPIMETHEUS.

Hold!

Arrest the Prefects!

PROMETHEUS.

But not slay!-we will

Make our path bloodless;—one triumphal march

To Memphis and the tyrant's throne: no stain
Shall blot the holy wreath of liberty!

Our sacrifice of great thanksgiving offered

The immortal gods shall rise without a sigh

From one great nation's heart! For, oh! we have
Conquered ourselves: we have not bought with blood
Our natural, heaven-stamped birthright!-On to Memphis!
The victory of an hour is nothing: peace,

A lasting peace, can come but from yourselves;

Its solid basework fixed by law alone,

By duty, and triumphant principle.

VOICES FROM THE MULTITUDE.

King-live for ever! let us yoke ourselves.
To his triumphal car, and bear him on.

PROMETHEUS.

Hold-said ye not erewhile ye would be free?
Do freemen stoop to aught save the high gods?
Or imitate the offices of brutes?

I am, like ye, a fellow labourer

In this great work; and claim to be your leader
Only because I pointed first the way

That led to the broad path of honour. On!

EPIMETHEUS.

Dost thou hope, brother, with these unarmed crowds,

Howe'er in resolution panoplied,

To break the serried strength of armies reared

By discipline to battle?-to awake

Confidence in the distrustful public eye,

O'erawed by power, by habitude restrained?

Who look on Innovation but as danger,

Though Peace beside her walked, and Blessing stood,

With Victory by her side? Oh, rather, arm!

And, confident in Justice' triple shield,

Let Valour strike with his protended spear!

PROMETHEUS.

Thus would I act, my brother, looked I not
With a profounder hope and holier faith

Into the vast heart of Humanity,

And found the truths therein that shall deceive not.

There is a sense of justice and of right,

As of an unalienate liberty,

In mankind's bosom fixed immutable.
It may be overborne by circumstance,
O'erruled and stifled,—all but unforgot;
For it lies rooted there as is the oak,

Though by storms shattered or the woodman's hand.
The solitary voice may wake once more
(And that it doth, bear witness this great day)
Its spirit into life; but, when evoked

By thunders of the shouting multitudes,

In tones familiar and with outstretched hands,
Calling on freedom and their fellow-men,
Shall it not have its answer back from them
With a convulsion that shall topple thrones

To their foundations ?-Egypt's heart shall answer thee!

THE MULTITUDE.

It doth-we feel we are invincible!

PROMETHEUS.

Ye are so in the thought, which is already
Victory ratified by your will. To Memphis!
Onward in triumph!

THE MULTITUDE.

Liberty or death!

(Exeunt the people, in procession, guarding Prometheus in their centre, with shouts and songs of triumph.)

SCENE

IV.

"Ha, Majesty! how high thy glory towers When the rich blood of kings is set on fire!"

"Wilt thou draw near the nature of the gods?

Draw near them, then, in being merciful;
Sweet mercy is nobility's true badge."

SEAKESPEARE.