When Nature wants to name a man
And fame a man
And tame a man;
When Nature wants to shame a man
To do his heavenly best….
When she tries the highest test
That her reckoning may bring—
When she wants a god or king!—
How she reins him and restrains him
So his body scarce contains him
While she fires him
And inspires him!
Keeps him yearning, ever burning for a tantalising goal—
Lures and lacerates his soul.
Sets a challenge for his spirit,
Draws it higher when he's near it—
Makes a jungle, that he clear it;
Makes a desert, that he fear it
And subdue it if he can—
So doth Nature make a man.
Then, to test his spirit's wrath
Hurls a mountain in his path—
Puts a bitter choice before him
And relentless stands o'er him.
"Climb, or perish!" so she says….
Watch her purpose, watch her ways!
Nature's plan is wondrous kind
Could we understand her mind …
Fools are they who call her blind.
When his feet are torn and bleeding
Yet his spirit mounts unheeding,
All his higher powers speeding
Blazing newer paths and fine;
When the force that is divine
Leaps to challenge every failure and his ardor still is sweet
And love and hope are burning in the presence of defeat….
Lo, the crisis! Lo, the shout
That must call the leader out.
When the people need salvation
Doth he come to lead the nation….
Then doth Nature show her plan
When the world has found—a man!
Angela Morgan.
From "Forward, March!"
ORDER AND THE BEES
(FROM "HENRY V.")
We often wish that we might do some other man's work, occupy his social or political station. But such an interchange is not easy. The world is complex, and its adjustments have come from long years of experience. Each man does well to perform the tasks for which nature and training have fitted him. And instead of feeling envy toward other people, we should rejoice that all labor, however diverse, is to one great end—it makes life richer and fuller.
Therefore doth heaven divide
The state of man in divers functions,
Setting endeavor in continual motion;
To which is fixéd, as an aim or butt,
Obedience: for so work the honey-bees,
Creatures that by a rule in nature teach
The act of order to a peopled kingdom.
They have a king and officers of sorts;
Where some, like magistrates, correct at home,
Others, like merchants, venture trade abroad,
Others, like soldiers, arméd in their stings,
Make boot upon the summer's velvet buds;
Which pillage they with merry march bring home
To the tent-royal of their emperor:
Who, busied in his majesty, surveys
The singing masons building roofs of gold,
The civil citizens kneading up the honey,
The poor mechanic porters crowding in
Their heavy burdens at his narrow gate,
The sad-eyed justice, with his surly hum,
Delivering o'er to executors pale
The lazy yawning drone. I this infer,
That many things, having full reference
To one consent, may work contrariously.
William Shakespeare.