Irish Minstrelsy/Volume 2/Part 3/Prophecy of Donn Firinneach

by Aogán Ó Rathaille

THE PROPHECY OF DONN FIRINNEACH.¹

BY HENRY GRATTAN CURRAN.

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Does thy spirit despond that these wolves³ perfidious,
forsworn,
Should banish God's priests, and laugh his religion to
scorn;
Feeble, exiled, is Charles, the son of the monarch we
loved,
Far, far from the hearts, that would bleed to sustain him,
removed.

Oh foul is the treason, that bids us our truth abjure.
Our faith to our own regal race—oh! dark and impure
The breast that devised, and the traitor lip that proclaims
Our throne and our truth to belong to any but James.

The sun shall burst forth, and the clouds shall melt in his
sight,
And Heber's proud race shall awake in their native
might;
And the emperor shall weep, and Flanders writhe in the
chain,
And the "Brickler"⁴ exult in king James's chambers
again.

Erin's soul shall be glad in the hall, at the festive board—
And in science and song her sweet language o'er earth
be poured;
And the tongue of the churl shall in darkness and shame
go down.
And James shall return, the full joy of our hearts to
crown.

And the fables of Luther, that darken the holy word.
And the false ones that knelt not where God's own priests
adored;
That hour's retribution shall scatter from Erin's shore,
And Louis shall see what hearts our own prince adore.

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