Astra Victrix

England, elect of time,     By freedom sealed sublime,     And constant as the sun that saw thy dawn     Outshine upon the sea     His own in heaven, to be     A light that night nor day should see withdrawn,     If song may speak not now thy praise,     Fame writes it higher than song may soar or faith may gaze.     Dark months of months beheld     Hope thwarted, crossed, and quelled,     And heard the heartless hounds of hatred bay     Aloud against thee, glad     As now their souls are sad     Who see their hope in hatred pass away     And wither into shame and fear     And shudder down to darkness, loth to see or hear.     Nought now they hear or see     That speaks or shows not thee     Triumphant; not as empires reared of yore,     The imperial commonweal     That bears thy sovereign seal     And signs thine orient as thy natural shore     Free, as no sons but thine may stand,     Steers lifeward ever, guided of thy pilot hand.     Fear, masked and veiled by fraud,     Found shameful time to applaud     Shame, and bow down thy banner towards the dust,     And call on godly shame     To desecrate thy name     And bid false penitence abjure thy trust:     Till England's heart took thought at last,     And felt her future kindle from her fiery past.     Then sprang the sunbright fire     High as the sun, and higher     Than strange men's eyes might watch it undismayed:     But winds athwart it blew     Storm, and the twilight grew     Darkness awhile, an unenduring shade:     And all base birds and beasts of night     Saw no more England now to fear, no loathsome light.     All knaves and slaves at heart     Who, knowing thee what thou art,     Abhor thee, seeing what none save here may see,     Strong freedom, taintless truth,     Supreme in ageless youth,     Howled all their hate and hope aloud at thee     While yet the wavering wind of strife     Bore hard against her sail whose freight is hope and life.     And now the quickening tide     That brings back power and pride     To faith and love whose ensign is thy name     Bears down the recreant lie     That doomed thy name to die,     Sons, friends, and foes behold thy star the same     As when it stood in heaven a sun     And Europe saw no glory left her sky save one.     And now, as then she saw,     She sees with shamefast awe     How all unlike all slaves and tyrants born     Where bondmen champ the bit     And anarchs foam and flit,     And day mocks day, and year puts year to scorn,     Our mother bore us, English men,     Ashamed of shame and strong in mercy, now as then.     We loosed not on these knaves     Their scourge-tormented slaves:     We held the hand that fain had risen to smite     The torturer fast, and made     Justice awhile afraid,     And righteousness forego her ruthless right:     We warred not even with these as they;     We bade not them they preyed on make of them their prey.     All murderous fraud that lurks     In hearts where hell's craft works     Fought, crawled, and slew in darkness: they that died     Dreamed not of foes too base     For scorn to grant them grace:     Men wounded, women, children at their side,     Had found what faith in fiends may live:     And yet we gave not back what righteous doom would give.     No false white flag that fawns     On faith till murder dawns     Blood-red from hell-black treason's heart of hate     Left ever shame's foul brand     Seared on an English hand:     And yet our pride vouchsafes them grace too great     For other pride to dream of: scorn     Strikes retribution silent as the stars at morn.     And now the living breath     Whose life puts death to death,     Freedom, whose name is England, stirs and thrills     The burning darkness through     Whence fraud and slavery grew,     We scarce may mourn our dead whose fame fulfils     The record where her foes have read     That earth shall see none like her born ere earth be dead.