Hail! happy land where Freedom smiles secure

Hail! happy land where Freedom smiles secure, Where no proud tyrant robs the thrifty poor, No empty lordling grasps the whole domain, Nor famish'd farmer tills the fruitful plain; Each peasant's cottage is his castle wall, And Boundless Liberty defends us all: No pompous monarch wields a scepter here; No sacrilegious bishop do we fear; All unrestrain'd, no pow'r but law can bind, Columbia's sons are free as passing wind.

Time out of mind the poets us'd to stray O'er groves and grotts to paint the rural day, Rumag'd each mead and garden to complete The rough appendage of some country seat; Or rack'd invention to pourtray a grove, That only harbour'd innocence and love, Or wildly painted on the grassy mound Some simple shepherd with his flocks around— From scenes like these, congenial to my heart, Half pleas'd, half forced, some useless hours I part, And through the city mark each vari'd scene, Tho' wanton folly lists her veil between.

" Sweet Philadelphia! lovliest of the lawn," Where rising greatness opes its pleasing dawn, Where daring commerce spreads th' advent'rous sail, Cleaves thro' the wave and drives before the gale, Where genius yields her kind conducting lore, And learning spreads its inexhausted store:— Kind seat of industry, where art may see, Its labours foster'd to its due degree, Where merit meets the due reward it claims, Tho' envy dictates and tho' malice blames:— Thou fairest daughter of Columbia's train, The great emporium of the western plain; Best seat of science, friend to ev'ry art That mends, improves, or dignifies the heart; 'Tis thee I sing; thy various scenes display, And praise or blame or bring dark vice to day.