Classic Poem

We learned some Latin thirty years ago,
Some Greek; some other things — geometry;
Baseball; great store of rules by which to know
When thus was so, and if it was so, why.
And every day due share of pie we ate,
And Sunday under hour-long sermons sate,
And thrived on both; a sound NeWengland diet,
And orthodox. Let him who will decry it.

We spoke our Latin in the plain old way.
Tully was Cicero to Uncle Sam,
And Caesar, Caesar. Footballs in our day
Were spheres of rubber still. When autumn came
We kicked them, chasing after; but the sport
Was a mere pastime, not at all the sort
Of combat — strenuous, Homeric, fateful —
Whence heroes now wrest glory by the plateful.

The higher criticism was an infant then.
Curved pitching had not come, nor yellow shoes,
Nor bikes, nor telephones, nor golf, nor men
In knickerbockers. No one thought to use
Electric force to haul folks up a hill.
We walked, or rode on Concord coaches still.
Expansion's quirks stirred then no fiercer tussles
Than such as vexed the growing vogue of bustles.

Girls then, as now, to seminaries went,
But not so much as now to colleges.
The female understanding's scope and bent
Was thought to crave a round of 'ologies
Less full than man's. We've learned, it seems, since then
That women need whatever's good for men,
And that, thought boys are tough and girls more tender,
Knowledge is power, without regard to gender.

The shade austere of Puritan restraint
Showed sharper outlines, may be, then than now.

But not to hurt. For now the old complaint
Of joys curtailed gives place to wonder how,
'Twixt stress of sports and pleasant things to do,
And waxing claims of growing knowledge, too,
The modern lad gets time to feel the joy
It was, and still must be, to be a boy.

A checkered joy! Progress is man's desire.
And boys progress with swifter strides than men
To greater changes. Little boys aspire
To bigness, and it comes; nor turn again
Regretful eyes towards childhood. To grow strong,
And apt, and swift; to learn; to press along
Up life's first steeps and glory in each rise —
That's boyhood, as it seems to older eyes.

Time dwarfs the bulk of most material things.
The giants of our youth less monstrous seem,
Its wonders shrink when wider knowledge brings
The great world's standards to amend our dream.
But youth itself to backward glances looms
Up bigger than it is. The boy assumes,
To eyes that comprehend, the form and place
That gathering years may summon him to grace.

And what place is it he should strive to gain?
What ends achieve, to what his powers apply?
The same old simple precepts still obtain
That served for all men fit to pattern by.
Dear lads, we say, the greatest thing on earth
Is service: that's what justifies our birth.
Life can't be made worth living to a shirk.
You can't have even fun, unless you work.

Go make your bodies strong, your minds alert;
Train both to do for you the most they can.
Life's goal no runner reaches by a spurt;
Doing the daily stint's what makes the man.
And making men is Nature's chief concern;
For right men bring things right, each in its turn.
Strive, then, to help yourselves, and, that much learned,
Help others; nowise else contentment's earned.

Oh, money's good to have, and fame is sweet,
And leisure has its use, and sport its joys.
Go win them, if you may, and speed your feet!
But this regard: that even splendid toys
Are only toys: the important thing's not play,
But work. Who shun the burden of the day
Shall miss as well the strength they gain who bear it —
The fellowship they only feel who share it.