The Five Nations/The Wage-Slaves
THE WAGE-SLAVES
Oh glorious are the guarded heights
Where guardian souls abide—
Self-exiled from our gross delights—
Above, beyond, outside:
An ampler arc their spirit swings—
Commands a juster view—
We have their word for all these things,
Nor doubt their words are true.
Yet we the bondslaves of our day,
Whom dirt and danger press—
Co-heirs of insolence, delay,
And leagued unfaithfulness—
Such is our need must seek indeed
And, having found, engage
The men who merely do the work
For which they draw the wage.
From forge and farm and mine and bench,
Deck, altar, outpost lone—
Mill, school, battalion, counter, trench,
Rail, senate, sheepfold, throne—
Creation's cry goes up on high
From age to cheated age:
"Send us the men who do the work
For which they draw the wage."
Words cannot help nor wit achieve,
Nor e'en the all-gifted fool,
Too weak to enter, bide, or leave
The lists he cannot rule.
Beneath the sun we count on none
Our evil to assuage,
Except the men that do the work
For which they draw the wage.
When through the Gates of Stress and Strain
Comes forth the vast Event—
The simple, sheer, sufficing, sane
Result of labour spent—
They that have wrought the end unthought
Be neither saint nor sage,
But men who merely did the work
For which they drew the wage
Wherefore to these the Fates shall bend
(And all old idle things—)
Wherefore on these shall Power attend
Beyond the grasp of kings:
Each in his place, by right, not grace,
Shall rule his heritage—
The men who simply do the work
For which they draw the wage.
Not such as scorn the loitering street,
Or waste to earn its praise,
Their noontide's unreturning heat
About their morning ways:
But such as dower each mortgaged hour
Alike with clean courage—
Even the men who do the work
For which they draw the wage—
Men like to Gods that do the work
For which they draw the wage—
Begin—continue—close the work
For which they draw the wage!