" We find there identically the same doctrine that
there is in "Queen Mab,"--a systematic abhorrence of the servility
which renders man captive to power, denunciation of the love of gain
which blinds his insight and destroys his energy, of the prostitution
of religious faith, and, above all, of the slavery of womanhood. But
by this time the doctrine has more distinct in its expression, and far
more powerful in its utterance.
"Man seeks for gold in mines, that he may weave
A lasting chain for his own slavery;
In fear and restless care that he may live,
He toils for others, who must ever be
The joyless thralls of like captivity;
He murders, for his chiefs delight in ruin;
He builds the altar, that its idol's fee
May be his very blood; he is pursuing,
O blind and willing wretch! his own obscure undoing.
"Woman!--she is his slave, she has become
A thing I weep to speak,--the child of scorn,
The outcast of a desolated home.
Falsehood and fear and toil, like waves, have worn
Channels upon her cheek, which smiles adorn,
As calm decks the false ocean. Well ye know
What woman is; for none of woman born
Can choose but drain the bitter dregs of woe,
Which ever from the oppressed to the oppressors flow.
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