The following poem was written anonymously and published in Hugh Williams’s National Songs and Poetical Pieces (1839). Its sympathies are with the struggle for democracy and the emerging Chartist movement.

Is he fit for this world, or a better beyond,

Who when Liberty calls, finds no soul to respond?

Have our chains become baubles of which we grow fond?

               Is there yet spirit in England?

               Has England the will to be free?

Blind to the lessons of History’s page,

We carry the slave-stain from childhood to age,

And manhood is wasted in impotent rage.

               Is there yet spirit in England?

               Has England the will to be free?

Who dreadeth his foe, is o’ercome ere he fights, –

No dread must be ours when we struggle for rights,

When Liberty nerves us, and Justice incites!

               Is there yet spirit in England?

               Has England the will to be free?

Of oily-tongued statesmen no longer the dupes,

Nor bamboozled by tyrants, nor sabred by troops,—

Oh, hour of high dreaming! oh, day of proud hopes !

               Is there yet spirit in England?

               Has England the will to be free?

Let Oppression no longer stalk grim o’er our path—

She hath watch’d by our pillow, hath crouch’d by our hearth

Augmented our sorrow, and dashed all our mirth;—

               Is there yet spirit in England?

               Has England the will to be free?

Too long have we trusted to patience and prayer,

If arms are not palsied and hearts in despair,

For deeds and not words we will henceforth prepare;—

               If there is spirit in England—

               If England yet wills to be free!