Classic Poem

All ye who press and hurry along life's stony way,
Spurred onward by ambition that rests not, night or day;
Come, listen to a legend in plain and homely rhyme,
All of two gallant horsemen, two knights of olden time.

These knights had pledged each other above the flowing bowl,
To ride a race to-morrow, with London for the goal.
So they met at early morn, and both were brave to view;
One bore a scarlet banner and one a flag of blue.

One fiercely spurred his charger and madly tore away,
Waving his scarlet banner to meet the rising day;
And ere the dews of morning were drunk up by the sun,
He gaily sang, " The wager is just as good as won. "

But the knight who wore the blue took such an easy pace,
You never would have dreamed he was riding for a race,
With banner softly floating, he sang, " To win at last
In a long and weary contest, one must not ride too fast. "

Still tore away the other, on hill and sunny plain;
Wild flew the scarlet banner, back streamed the charger's mane,
His breath came quick and hot, there was foam on flank and breast;
Yet the fierce and fiery rider gave not a moment's rest.

The day grew hot and hotter, the summer sun rode high;
Noon came; there stood an inn, but the fierce knight passed it by.
Still onward — but the charger was faint and weary grown;
His splendid head was drooping, his strength was spent and gone.

The spurs were buried deeper, blood mingled with the foam,
But spur and whip were bootless — the beast was over come.
He turned a sad eye backward, with plaintive, piteous moan,
Yet his master steeled to pity, still sought to spur him on.

But lo! the angry horseman heard hoof-beats close abreast,
'Twas a brave and gallant charger refreshed by food and rest.
A blue flag gaily floating, just brushed against his cheek;
But not a word he uttered — he was too wroth to speak.

Away sped horse and rider, and ere the sun went down
They swept into a court yard of mighty London town.
But the evening fogs hung brooding o'er the city's lessened din,
When a steed all spent and halting came faintly staggering in.

Limp hung the scarlet banner, all trailing dismally;
Oh! that jaded horse and rider were a sorry sight to see!
Not once for rest had paused he — that fierce and fiery knight —
And now was lost his wager and his steed was ruined quite.

Thus ends the ancient tale with its moral clear and strong,
And the moral, not the tale, is the burden of my song.
It is but this: He loses who presses on too fast,
And patient moderation is winner at the last.

The rougher are the steeps and the longer is the road,
More fatal to success are impatient spur and goad.
Great things are works of time — for true growth must have its way;
No structure that remaineth was builded in a day.

That pale, misguided youth who burns the midnight oil,
Gains little in reward for his tense and wearying toil,
Save features pinched and hollow, locks prematurely white,
Save broken health and spirits, save dimned and failing sight.

Along life's rugged hillside lies many a shattered hope,
Wrecked in the fiery struggle up the steep and stony slope.
And oh! the pain of weeping above a broken life!
Oh! the agony of falling, defeated in the strife!

To rest as well as labor, God made both brawn and brain,
And strongest brain and muscle endure not ceaseless strain,
Let once the strings be broken, the loss is great indeed —
Work, then, but labor wisely — and thine be labor's meed.