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Stanzas on the Emigration to America, and Peopling the Western Country, in Poems
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Historical SummaryFreneau was a man of literary versatility, chiefly remembered for his abuse of Washington while editor of the National Gazelle and Jefferson’s protégé.—For Freneau, the poet, see Duyckinck, Cyclopœdia of American Literature, I, 327–348; Tyler, Literary History of the Revolution, I, 171–183, 413–425.
36."Peopling the Western Country" (1785)
BY PHILIP FRENEAU
TO western woods, and lonely plains, Palemon from the crowd departs, Where nature’s wildest genius reigns, To tame the soil, and plant the arts — What wonders there shall freedom show, What mighty States successive grow!
From Europe’s proud, despotic shores Hither the stranger takes his way, And in our new found world explores A happier soil, a milder sway, Where no proud despot holds him down, No slaves insult him with a crown.
What charming scenes attract the eye, On wild Ohio’s savage stream! Here nature reigns, whose works outvie The boldest pattern art can frame; Here ages past have roll’d away, And forests bloom’d—but to decay.
From these fair plains, these rural seats, So long conceal’d, so lately known, The unsocial Indian far retreats, To make some other clime his own, Where other streams, less pleasing, flow, And darker forests round him grow.
Great Sire of floods! whose varied wave Through climes and countries takes its way, To whom creating nature gave Ten thousand streams to swell thy sway! No longer shall they useless prove, Nor idly through the forests rove;
Nor longer shall thy princely flood From distant lakes be swell’d in vain, Nor longer through a darksome wood Advance, unnotic’d, to the main, Far other ends the fates decree — And commerce plans new freights for thee.
While virtue warms the generous breast, Here heaven-born freedom shall reside, Nor shall the voice of war molest, Nor Europe’s all-aspiring pride — Here reason shall new laws devise, And order from confusion rise.
Forsaking kings and regal state, (A debt that reason deems amiss) The traveller owns, convinc’d though late, No realm so free, so blest as this — The east is half to slaves consign’d, And half to slavery more refin’d.
O come the time, and haste the day, When man shall man no longer crush, When reason shall enforce her sway, Nor these fair regions raise our blush, Where still the African complains, And mourns his yet unbroken chains.
Far brighter scenes, a future age, The muse predicts, these States shall hail, Whose genius shall the world engage, Whose deeds shall over death prevail, And happier systems bring to view Than all the eastern sages knew.
Philip Freneau, (Philadelphia, 1786), 378–380.
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Chicago: Philip Freneau, "36.Peopling the Western Country (1785)," Stanzas on the Emigration to America, and Peopling the Western Country, in Poems in American History Told by Contemporaries, ed. Albert Bushnell Hart (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1902), 119. Original Sources, accessed May 1, 2024, http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=8UBE2ZVTP514P2C.
MLA: Freneau, Philip. "36."Peopling the Western Country" (1785)." Stanzas on the Emigration to America, and Peopling the Western Country, in Poems, in American History Told by Contemporaries, edited by Albert Bushnell Hart, Vol. 3, New York, The Macmillan Company, 1902, page 119. Original Sources. 1 May. 2024. http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=8UBE2ZVTP514P2C.
Harvard: Freneau, P, '36."Peopling the Western Country" (1785)' in Stanzas on the Emigration to America, and Peopling the Western Country, in Poems. cited in 1902, American History Told by Contemporaries, ed. , The Macmillan Company, New York, pp.119. Original Sources, retrieved 1 May 2024, from http://originalsources.com/Document.aspx?DocID=8UBE2ZVTP514P2C.
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