America

NOR force nor fraud shall sunder us! O ye Who north or south, on east or western land, Native to noble sounds, say truth for truth, Freedom for freedom, love for love, and God For God; O ye who in eternal youth Speak with a living and creative flood This universal English, and do stand Its breathing book; live worthy of that grand Heroic utterance—parted, yet a whole, Far yet unsever’d,—children brave and free Of the great Mother-tongue, and ye shall be Lords of an empire wide as Shakespeare’s soul, Sublime as Milton’s immemorial theme, And rich as Chaucer’s speech, and fair as Spenser’s dream.