The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #19551   Message #200662
Posted By: Stewie
24-Mar-00 - 09:34 AM
Thread Name: Gospel Origin-Civil Rights & Labor Songs
Subject: Lyr Add: THE ABOLITIONIST HYMN^^
Here's another one:

THE ABOLITIONIST HYMN

We ask not that the slave should lie
As lies his master, at his ease
Beneath a silken canopy
Or in the shade of blooming trees

We ask not 'eye for eye' that all
Who forge the chain and ply the whip
Should feel their torture while the thrall
Should wield the scourge of mastership

We mourn not that the man should toil;
'Tis nature's need, 'tis God's decree;
But let the hand that tills the soil
Be, like the wind that fans it, free

This was from Abolitionist anti-slavery singing circles in the years just before the Civil War. It was set to an old hymn: 'Old Hundred'.

--Stewie.