THE SOLUTION
To be, or not to be,—that is the question.—Shakespeare.
Why should man struggle here?
Is’t not the hope of something yet in life,
Some great achievement, some heroic feat
Which worth’ly succors to humanity,
That lights the dimmed, expiring spark of life
And bids us still seek in adversity
The means to atone for all our erring past
And strive to gain the haven of the blest,
The soul’s most glorious prize,—that thing eterne?
Cut off by one weak, frail, ’gainst-nature act,—
By use of sword, or gun, or poisoned vial,—
What hope exists the prize of life to win,
When every means therefor is wrested ’way,
And our life’s strength ebbs out in the warping clay?