ON WEALTH
The Prayer to Mammon
Cast birth into the nether Hell; let all
The useless tribe of talents farther fall;
Throw virtue headlong from a rock and turn
High nobleness into the fire to burn;
The heroic heart let some swift thunder rive,
Our enemy that hinders us to live;
Wealth let us only keep; this one thing less,
All those become as weeds and emptiness.
A Miracle
Behold a wonder mid the sons of men!
The man is undiminished he we knew,
Unmaimed his organs and his senses keen
Even as of old, his actions nowise new,
Voice, tone and words the same we heard before,
The brain’s resistless march too as of yore;
Only the nattering heat of wealth is gone,
And lo! the whole man changed, his praises done.
Wealth the Sorcerer
He
who has wealth, has birth; gold who can spill,
Is
scholar, doctor, critic, what you will;
For
who has golden coin, has golden tongue,
Is
glorious, gracious, beautiful and young;
All
virtues, talents, fames to gold repair
And
lodge in gold leaving the poor man bare.
Page– 178
Two Kinds of Loss
These things are deaths, ill-counsel
ruining kings,
The son by fondling spoiled, by him the
race,
Attachment, to the sage’s heart that
clings,
And natural goodness marred by company
base,
The Brahmin by scant study unbrahminised,
Sweet shame by wine o’erthrown, by
wandering long
Affection waning, friendship true unprized,
Tillage uncared, good fortune follies
wrong;
But wealth in double way men may reject,
Nobly by giving, poorly by neglect.
The Triple Way of Wealth
Three
final roads wealth takes and only three,
To
give, enjoy or lose it utterly:
And
his whose miser hand to give is slow
Nor
yet enjoys, the worst third way shall go.
The Beauty of Giving
Be not a miser of thy strength and store;
Oft in a wounded grace more beauty is.
The jewel which the careful gravers score;
The sweet fair girl-wife broken with bridal
bliss,
The rut-worn tusker, the autumnal stream
With its long beaches dry and slender
flood;
The hero wreathed with victory’s diadem,
Adorned with wounds and glorious with his blood;
The moon’s last disc; rich men of their
bright dross,
By gifts disburdened, fairer shine by loss.
Page– 179
Circumstance
There is no absoluteness in
objects. See
This indigent man aspire as to a
prize
To handfuls of mere
barley-bread! yet he
A few days past, fed full with
luxuries,
Held for a trifle earth and all
her skies.
Not in themselves are objects great or small,
But circumstance works on the elastic mind,
To widen or contract. The view
is all,
And by our inner state the
world’s defined.
Advice to a King
He fosters, King, the calf who
milks the cow,
And thou who takest of the wide earth tax,
Foster the people; with laborious brow
And sleepless vigil strive till
nought it lacks.
Then shall the earth become thy faery tree
Of plenty, pleasure, fame, felicity.
Policy
Often she lies, wears sometimes
brow of truth,
Kind sometimes, sometimes ravening-merciless;
Now open-handed, full of bounty
and grace,
And now a harpy; now sweet honey
and ruth
Flows from her tongue, now
menace harsh or stern;
This moment with a bottomless
desire
She gathers millions in, the
next will tire, —
Endless expense takes prodigally
its turn.
Thus like a harlot changes
momently
In princes the chameleon Policy.
Page– 180
The Uses of High Standing
Men highly placed by six good
gifts are high
The first is noble liberality;
The second, power that swift
obedience brings;
Service to holy men and holy
things
Comes next; then fame;
protection then of friends;
Pleasure in pleasant things the
great list ends.
Whose rising with these six is
unallied,
What seeks he by a mighty
prince’s side ?
Remonstrance with the
Suppliant
What the Creator on thy forehead
traced
As on a plate of bronze
indelibly,
Expect that much or little,
worst or best,
Wherever thou dwell, nobly or
wretchedly,
Since thou shalt not have less,
though full of pain
In deserts waterless mid savage
men
Thou wander sole; nor on
Olympus-hoar
Ranked amid mighty Gods shalt
thou have more.
Therefore be royal-hearted still
and bold,
0 man, nor thy proud crest in
vain abase
Cringing to rich men for their
gathered gold.
From the small well or ocean
fathomless
The jar draws equally what it
can hold.
The Rain-lark to the
Cloud
You opulent clouds that in high
heavens ride,
Is’t fame you seek?
but surely all men know
To you the darting
rain-larks homage owe!
Hold you then back your showers,
because your pride
By our low suings must be
gratified ?
Page– 181
To the Rain-lark
0 rain-lark, rain-lark, flitting
near the cloud,
Attentive hear, winged friend, a
friendly word.
All vapours are not like, the
heavens that shroud
Darkening; some drench the earth
for noble fruit,
Some are vain thunderers
wandering by with bruit:
Sue not to each thou seest then,
0 bird;
If humbly entreat thou must, let few have heard.
Page– 182
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