Then came heaps of merchandize,
Surfeiting the greedy eyes
Of the multitude; and then
The stern array of armed men;
Heaps on heaps of merchandize,
Borne by ghastliest Miseries,-
Painfully, as slaves may bear
Their own funeral urns,-Despair
Goading them; and then again
Follow'd hard the armed train,
And the pomp and clanging roar
Of the heralds, as before.
Wrinkled Lies in royal dresses,
Wigg'd and ermined Hollownesses,
Bore the ensigns of the Lord
Of the Balance and the Sword.
And then upon an iron car
Came the God of fraudful war,
’Mid the whirl of myriad wheels,
A sound as of a navy's keels.
Naked women, worn and wan,
With their heart-strings drew him on,-
Women even with daintier skins
Than are hid in English mines.
Aye the fiend with venom'd thong
Drove his lewd-eyed team along,
Thrö a plausive gaping throng,
None objecting to the wrong.
He was clothed in the hide
Of a labourer; and did ride
Softly, for his carriage swung
On human sinews, deftly hung.
So above the crowd rode he,
A new-featured Trinity:
The old triple-headed thief
Who did hold Hell's gate in fief.
Fear and Loyalty and Trade
Are his names, by liars made
As vizors, whereon knaves may see
The pleasant leer of sophistry.
(What is Fear but Sloth and Shame? Loyalty a coward's name
For slavish Custom? Trade no less Than corruptest Selfishness?)
On his hand the Priest did lean:
Like a whitéd tomb, obscene,
The first blasphemer stood bewray'd—
Even the God-father of Trade.
Following them with saintly glance,
Crept the vile fiend Tolerance:
Inquisition re-baptized,
The old brute Torture spiritualized;
Fraud, and jealous Hate, and Dread Of others' good, and Care bested With insecurities, and Pain
With palzied hand and sleepless brain,
And Avarice with his golden lips
(The earthy-hearted fool who clips. A golden image till he dies,
Like Ixion, of inanities);
And Speculation-bubble-hollow:
These, and such as these, did follow
At the wheels of Trade, to wait
On his lusts immediate.
After them a motley crew
Of his slaves, like leaves, did strew
The road with wither'd forms, indrawn
By the rush of wheels foregone-
(Terribly their idiot eyes, Torch-bearing insanities,
Glaring fiercely, did disclose
The sad expression of their woes).
Loathsome Vices-such as foul
The depths of mines,-dark Wants that scowl
Into the eyes of Power, and Wrath
Whose only food is others' scathe,-
Deformity, and sore Disease,
And crippled Wretchednesses,-these,
With myriad other forms of pain,
Did complete the MERCHANT'S train.
To his palace him they brought;
And in vessels noblest-wrought
Servéd him :-the while he ate,
Famine moan'd before his gate.
When the feast was at its height,
When the noontide of his might
Shone in heaven, self-glorified,
He did raise Him in his pride,
And bade a herald voice be hurl'd For his God-ship thrö the world :— 'LET MANKIND BOW DOWN TO ME, 'THE GOLDEN IMAGED DEITY!'
In the blasphemy of will
Stood He up, and, strong in ill,
Spake the Word whose fearful breath
Sold the eternal LOVE to Death.
And the Spirit of that Spell-
Like a Gospel out of Hell-
Grew in stature till its shade
Over all the earth was spread.
All things sicken'd in that Curse,
Wasting down from worse to worse
In the shadow of the tree
Of the Upas-deity.
Pestilential was the air,
Trade winds creeping everywhere:
Even infants suck'd disease,
And died upon their mothers' knees.
And the life from human things
Stole away; and angel wings
Falter'd; and the God-like soul
Was not, but a tortured ghoul
Dug the mines of earth, where slaves
Hollow'd out their narrow graves
In young days; and Hope became
The shadow of a passed flame.
So the Plague grew more and more,
Till it clomb unto the door
Of the Commerce-God, where He
In his Heaven sate gorgeously.
And beside Him sate the Curse,
Till its breath was as the hearse
Of its victim, and self-fear
Wrap'd Him as an atmosphere:
Till his chin sank in his chest,
And his brow drop'd on his breast,
And his lank and weedy hair
Drew Him earthward; till the air
Shriek'd with anguish for the sore
Of the pestilence He wore;
Till the Plague which He became
Choked itself, and-as a flame
In its own smoke and stench-He died
In the very fulness of his pride:
And men were without Trade, and free
In the Heaven of Love's wide charity.
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