Performances
Learn & Engage
Notes & Translations
Charles Shadle
Boast not proud English, of thy birth and blood
Thy Brother Indian is by birth as Good.
Of one blood God made Him, and Thee, and All.
As wise, as faire, as strong, as personall.
By nature, wrath’s his portion, thine, no more
Till Grace his soule and thine in Christ restore.
Make sure thy second birth, else thou shalt see
Heaven ope to Indians wild, but shut to thee.
poem by Roger Williams (1603-1683)
from A Key into the Language of America, 1643