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Page:The poems of Richard Watson Gilder, Gilder, 1908.djvu/331

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THE TOOL
303

They are the same, that shameful horde,
The same their shameless song;
Beneath his shield they draw the sword
For rapine and for wrong.


Fight on! fight on! brave comrades all,
Nor weep the blameless knight;
They cannot fail, what tho' they fall,
Who battle for the right.


One Captain less in our good war,
But see! a thousand spring
Intent as never men before
To strike the Accursèd Thing.


THE DEMAGOGUE

All mouth, no mind; a mindless mouth in sooth;
He does not bend his strength to seek the truth,
But, shrewdly guessing what may take the crowd,
With tragic grimace, this he shouts aloud.
No true opinion, no fixed faith has he,
But gravely simulates sincerity.
His many causes swift resolve to one:
You find him his own cause when all is done.


THE TOOL

The man of brains, of fair repute, and birth,
Who loves high place above all else of earth;
Who loves it so, he 'll go without the power
If he may hold the semblance but an hour;
Willing to be some sordid creature's tool
So he but seem a little while to rule;
On him even moral pigmies would look down;
Were prizes given for shame, he'd wear the crown.