The Union

by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Source of witness transcribed: The Southern Sentinel (Plaquemine, Parish of Iberville, Louisiana)

Date of witness transcribed: 9 January 1850

Notes about this poem: "The Union" was printed in at least 224 newspapers during the nineteenth century. It can be found using ID 2408800 in this table of most widely-reprinted poems.

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• Thou, too, sail on, O ship of State!
• Sail on, O Union, strong and great!
• Humanity, with all its fears,
• With all the hopes of future years,
• Is hanging breathless on thy fate!
• We know what master laid thy keel,
• What workmen wrought thy ribs of steel,
• Who made each mast, each sail, each rope,
• What anvils sang, what hammers beat,
• In what a forge and what a heat,
• Were shaped the anchors of thy hope!
• Fear not each sudden sound and shock,
• ‘Tis of the wave and not the rock;
• ‘Tis but the flapping of the sail,
• And not a rent made by the gale!
• In spite of rock and tempest’s roar,
• In spite of false lights on the shore,
• Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea!
• Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee:
• Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, tears,
• Are all with thee—are all with thee!