Truth is eternal, but her effluence,
With endless change, is fitted to the hour:
Her mirror is turn’d forward, to reflect
The promise of the future, not the past.
He who would win the name of truly great
Must understand his own age and the next,
And make the present ready to fulfil
Its prophecy, and with the future merge
Gently and peacefully, as wave with wave.
The future works out great men’s destinies;