![Ecclesiastical Sonnets - Part II. - IV - Deplorable His Lot Who Tills The Ground, By: William Wordsworth](https://i0.wp.com/poetrycatalog.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/Ecclesiastical-Sonnets-Part-II-IV-Deplorable-His-Lot-Who-Tills-The-Ground-By-William-Wordsworth.png?resize=750%2C420&ssl=1)
Deplorable his lot who tills the ground,
His whole life long tills it, with heartless toil
Of villain-service, passing with the soil
To each new Master, like a steer or hound,
Or like a rooted tree, or stone earth-bound;
But mark how gladly, through their own domains,
The Monks relax or break these iron chains;
While Mercy, uttering, through their voice, a sound
Echoed in Heaven, cries out, “Ye Chiefs, abate
These legalized oppressions! Man whose name
And nature God disdained not; Man whose soul
Christ died for, cannot forfeit his high claim
To live and move exempt from all control
Which fellow-feeling doth not mitigate!”