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Title: Oration, Which Might Have Been Delivered
Author: Francis Hopkinson [
More Titles by Hopkinson]
FRIENDS and associates! lend a patient ear,
Suspend intestine broils and reason hear.
Ye followers of ___ your wrath forbear--
Ye sons of _____ your invectives spare;
The fierce dissension your high minds pursue
Is sport for others--ruinous to you.
Surely some fatal influenza reigns,
Some epidemic rabies turns your brains;
Is this a time for brethren to engage
In public contest and in party rage?
Fell discord triumphs in your doubtful strife,
And, smiling, whets her anatomic knife;
Prepared to cut our precious limbs away
Ana leave the bleeding body to decay.
Seek ye for foes? alas, my friends, look round.
In every street, see numerous foes abound!
Methinks I hear them cry, in varied tones,
"Give us our father's--brother's--sister's bones."
Methinks I see a mob of sailors rise--
"Revenge!--revenge!" they cry, and damn their eyes--
"Revenge for comrade Jack, whose flesh they say,
You minced to morsels and then threw away."
Methinks I see a black infernal train--
The genuine offspring of accursed Cain--
Fiercely on you their angry looks are bent.
They grin and gibber dangerous discontent.
And seem to say--"Is there not meat enough?
Ah! massa cannibal, why eat poor Cuff?"
Even hostile watchmen stand in strong array.
And o'er our heads their threatening staves display:
Howl hideous discord through the noon of night,
And shake their dreadful lanthorns in our sight.
Say, are not these sufficient to engage
Your high wrought souls eternal war to wage?
Combine your strength these monsters to subdue.
No friends of science and sworn foes to you;
On these--on these, your wordy vengeance pour,
And strive our fading glory to restore.
Ah! think how, late, our mutilated rites
And midnight orgies, were by sudden frights
And loud alarms profaned--the sacrifice,
Stretch'd on a board before our eager eyes.
All naked lay--even when our chieftain stood
Like a high priest, prepared for shedding blood;
Prepared, with wonderous skill to cut or slash.
The gentle sliver or the deep drawn gash;
Prepared to plunge even elbow deep in gore,
Nature and nature's secrets to explore--
Then a tumultuous cry--a sudden fear--
Proclaim'd the foe--the enraged foe is near--
In some dark hole the hard-got corse was laid,
And we, in wild conclusion, led dismay'd.
Think how, like brethren, we have shared the toil,
When in the Potter's field we sought for spoil,
Did midnight ghosts and death and horror brave--
To delve for science in the dreary grave.--
Shall I remind you of that awful night
When our compacted band maintained the fight
Against an armed host?--fierce was the fray,
And yet we bore our sheeted prize away.
Firm on a horse's back the corse was laid,
High blowing winds the winding sheet display'd ;
Swift flew the steed--but still his burthen bore--
Fear made him fleet, who ne'er was fleet before;
O'er tombs and sunken graves he coursed around.
Nor aught respected consecrated ground.
Meantime the battle raged--so loud the strife,
The dead were almost frighten'd into life--
Though not victorious, yet we scorn'd to yield,
Retook our prize, and left the doubtful field.
In this degenerate age, alas! how few
The paths of science with true zeal pursue?
Some trifling contest, some delusive joy
Too oft the unsteady minds of youth employ.
For me--whom Esculapius hath inspired--
I boast a soul with love of science fired;
By one great object is my heart possess'd--
One ruling passion quite absorbs the rest--
In this bright point my hopes and fears unite;
And one pursuit alone can give delight
To me things are not as to vulgar eyes,
I would all nature's works anatomize--
This world a living monster seems, to me.
Rolling and sporting in the aerial sea;
The soil encompasses her rocks and stones
As flesh in animals encircles bones.
I see vast ocean, like a heart in play,
Pant systole and diastole every day,
And by unnumbered venous streams supply'd
Up her broad river force the arterial tide.
The world's great lungs, monsoons and tradewinds show
From east to west, from west to east they blow
Alternate respiration---
The hills are pimples which earth's face defile,
And burning AEtna, an eruptive bile:
From her vast body perspirations rise,
Condense in clouds and float beneath the skies:
Thus fancy, faithful servant of the heart.
Transforms all nature by her magic art
E'en mighty love, whose power all powers controls;
Is not, in me, like love in other souls--
Yet I have loved--and Cupid's subtle dart
Hath through my pericardium pierced my heart
Brown Cadavera did my soul ensnare,
Was all my thought by night and daily care--
I long'd to clasp, in her transcendant charms,
A living skeleton within my arms.
Long, lank, and lean, my Cadavera stood.
Like the tall pine, the glory of the wood--
Oft times I gazed, with learned skill to trace
The sharp edged beauties of her bony face--
There rose os frontis prominent and bold,
In deep sunk orbits two large eye-balls roll'd, .
Beneath those eye-balls, two arch'd bones were seen
Whereon two flabby cheeks hung loose and lean;
Beneath those cheeks, proturberant arose,
In form triangular, her lovely nose,
Like Egypt's pyramid it seem'd to rise,
Scorn earth, and bid defiance to the skies;
Thin were her lips, and of a sallow hue,
Her open'd mouth exposed her teeth to view;
Projecting strong, protuberant and wide
Stood incisores--and on either side
The canine ranged, with many a beauteous flaw,
And last the grinders, to fill up the jaw--
All in their alveoli fix'd secure,
Articulated by gomphosis sure.
Around her mouth, perpetual smiles had made
Wrinkles wherein the loves and graces play'd;
There, stretch'd and rigid by continual strain,
Appeared the zygomatic muscles plain,
And broad montanus o'er her peaked chin
Extended to support the heavenly grin.
Long were her fingers and her knuckles bare,
Much like the claw-foot of a walnut chair.
So plain was complex metacarpus shown
It, might be fairly counted bone by bone.
Her slender phalanxes were well defined.
And each with each by ginglymus combined.
Such were the charms that did my fancy fire,
And love--chaste, scientific love inspire.
At length my Cadavera fell beneath
The fatal stroke of all subduing death--
Three days in grief--three nights in tears I Spent,
And fighs incessant gave my sorrows vent.
Few are th'examples of a love so true--
Ev'n from her death I consolation drew.
And in a secret hour approached her grave
Resolv'd her precious corse from worms to save;
With active haste remov'd the incumbent clay,
Seiz'd the rich prize and bore my love away.
Her naked charms now lay before my fight,
I gaz'd with rapture and supreme delight.
Nor could forbear, in ecstasy, to cry--
Beneath that shrivell'd skin what treatures lie!
Then feasted to the full my amorous foul.
And skinn'd and cut and slafh'd without control.
'TwAs then I saw, what long I'd wish'd to see,
That heart which panted oft for love and me —'
In detail view'd the form I once ador'd.
And nature's hidden mysteries explor'd.
Alas! too truly did the wife man say
That flesh is grass, and subject to decay —
Not so the bones — of substance firm and hard
Long they remain th' anatomist's reward."
Wise nature, in her providential care.
Did, kindly, bones from vile corruption spare,
That sons their fathers' skeletons might have
And heav'n born science triumph o'er the grave.
My true love's bones I boil'd--from fat and lean
These hands industrious scrap'd them fair and clean,
And every bone did to its place restore.
As nature's hand had placed them long before;
These fingers twisled ev'ry pliant wire
With patient skill, urg'd on by strong desire.
Now what remains of Cadavera's mine.
Securely hanging in a cafe of pine.
Ofttimes I sit and contemplate her charms,
Her nodding skull and her long dangling arms,
'Till quite inflam'd with passion for the dead
I take her beauteous skeleton to bed--
There stretch'd, at length, close to my faithful side
She lies all night a lovely grinning bride.--
Excuse, my friends, this detail of my love.
You must th' intent, if not the tale approve;
By facts exemplary I meant to shew
To what extent a genuine zeal will go.
A mind, so fix'd, will not be drawn aside
By vain difTentions or a partial pride;
But ev'ry hostile sentiment subdue
And keep the ruling passion still in view.
False delicacy--prejudices strong.
Which no distinctions know 'twixt right and wrong,
Against our noble science spend their rage
And mark th' ignorance of this vulgar age.
Time was, when men their living slesh would spare
And to the knife their quiv'ring nates bare,
Thankful surgeons notes might obtain
For noses lost--and cut and come again--
But now the living churlishly refuse
To give their dead relations to our use;
Talk of decorum--and a thousand whims--
Whene'er we hack their wives' or daughters' limbs;
And yet their tables daily they supply
With the rich fruits of sad mortality ;
Will pick, and gut and cook a chicken's corse,
Dissect and eat it up without remorse;
Devouring fish, flesh, fowl, whatever comes,
Nor fear the ghosts of murder'd hecatombs.
Now Where's the difference?--to th' impartial eye
A leg of mutton and a human thigh
Are just the fame--for surely all must own
Flesh is but flesh, and bone is only bone;
And
And tho' indeed, some flesh and bone may grow
To make a monkey--some to make a beau,
Still the materials are the fame, we know.
Nor can our anatomic knowledge trace
Internal marks diftinftive of our race.--
Whence, then, these loud complaints--thefe hosts
Combin'd our useful labours to oppose? [of foes
How long shall foolish prejudices reign?
And when shall reason her just empire gain?
Ah! full of danger is the up-hill road.
That leads the youth to learning's high abode:
His way thick mists of vulgar errors blind,
And sneering satire follows close behind;
Sour envy strews the rugged path with thorns,
And lazy ignorance his labour scorns.
Is this a time, ye brethren of the knife.
For civil contest and internal strife?
When loud against us gen'ral clamours cry,
And persccution lifts her lash on high?
When government--that many headed beast--
Against our practice rears her horrid creft,
And, our nocturnal access to oppose,
Around the dead a penal barrier [1] throws?
To crush our schools her awful pow'r applies,
And ev'n forbids the gibbet's just supplies.[2]
Yet in this night of darkness, storms and fears,
Behold one bright benignant star [3] appears--
Long
[1] A law past at New-York, making it penal to steal bodies rom the burial ground,
[2] The wheelbarrow ot'Pennfylvania.
[3] The Medical College.
Long may it shine, and, e'er it's course is run,
Increase, in size and splendour, to a sun!--
Methinks I see this sun of future days,
Spread far abroad his diplomatic rays--
See life and health submit to his controul,
And like a planet, death around him roll.
Methinks I see a stately fabric rife,
Rear'd on the skulls of these our enemies:
I see the bones of our invet'rate foes
Hang round its walls in scientific rows.
There solemn fit the learned of the day
Dispensing death with uncontrouled sway,
And by prescription regulate with ease
The sudden crisis or the flow disease.
Then shall physicians their millenium find.
And reign the real sov'reigns of mankind:
Then shall the face of this vile world be chang'd--
And nature's healthful laws all new arrang'd--
In min'ral powders all her dufl shall rife,
And all her insects shall be Spanifh flies:
In medicated potions streams shall flow,
Pills fall in hail-storms, and sharp salts in snow;
In ev'ry quagmire bolusses be found,
And slimy cataplasms spread the ground--
Nature herself assume the chymist's part,
And furnish poisons unsublim'd by art.
Then to our schools shall wealth in currents flow,
Our theatres no want of subjects know;
Nor laws nor mobs th' Anatomist shall dread,
For graves shall freely render up their dead.
[The end]
Franchis Hopkinson's poem: Oration, Which Might Have Been Delivered
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