"We Wait Beneath the Furnace Blast" (1862)
Song and Quartette.
Words by John Greenleaf Whittier, 1807-1892. 
Music by W. O. Perkins.

Boston: Oliver Ditson & Co., 277 Washington St.
New York: Firth, Pond & Co.
Cincinnati: John Church, Jr.
Boston: J. C. Haynes & Co.
Philadelphia: J. C. Gould
Boston: C. C. Clapp & Co.
Plate Number: 21470
[Source: 090/136@Levy]

[Each VERSE is repeated for QUARTETTE]
1. We wait beneath the furnace blast 
The pangs of transformation: 
Not painlessly does God recast 
And mould anew the nation. 
Hot burns the fire 
Where wrongs expire, 
Nor spares the hand 
That from the land 
Uproot the ancient evil.

2. The handbreadth cloud the sages fear’d, 
Its bloody rain is dropping; 
The poison plant the fathers spared 
All else is ever topping, 
East, West, South, North, 
Is curses earth; 
All justice dies, 
And fraud and lies 
Live only in its shadow.

3. What gives the wheatfield blades of steel?
What points the rebel cannon?
What sets the roaring rabble’s heel
On the old starspangled pennon?
What beaks the oath
Of the men of the South?
What whets the knife
For the Union’s life?—
Hark to the answer: SLAVERY!

4. Then waste no blows on lesser foes
In strife unworthy freemen.
God lifts to day the veil and shows
The features of the demon!
O North and South,
Its victims both,
Can ye not cry,
“Let Slavery die!”
And union find a freedom?

5. What though the cast and spirit tear
The nation in his going?
We who have shared the guilt must share
The pang of his overthrowing!
Whate’er the loss,
Whate’er the cross,
Shall they complain
Of present pain
Who trust in God’s hereafter?

6. For who that leanes on His right arm
Was ever yet forsaken?
What righteous cause can suffer harm
If he its part has taken?
Though wild and loud
And dark the cloud,
Behind its folds
His blood upholds
The calm sky of tomorrow!

7. Above the maddening cry for blood,
Above the wild wardrumming,
Let Freedom’s voice be heard, with good
The evil overcoming.
Give prayer and purse
To stay the Curse
Whose wrong we share,
Whose shame we bear,
Whose end shall gladden Heaven!

8. In vain the bells of war shall ring
Of triumphs and revenges,
While still is spared the evil thing
That severs and estranges.
But, blest the ear
That yet shall hear
The jubilant bell
That rings the knell
Of Slavery for ever!


9. Then let the selfish lip be dumb,
And hushed the breath of sighing;
Before the joy of peace, must come
The pain of purifying.
God give us grace
Each in his place
To bear his lot,
And murmuring not,
Endure and wait and labor!