POINTS FOR PATRIOTS. (1917)
From the March 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard
Breathes there a man with soul so dead —
Some modern slave at factory gate
Who never to himself hath said,
In cynic bitterness and hate:
"This is my own, my native land"
Breathes there a man with soul so dead —
A numbered hand in a factory hell
Who never to himself hath said,
When hurried to toil by the factory bell:
"This is my own, my native land"?
Breathes there a man with soul so dead
Mocked by flaunted wealth and power
Who never to himself hath said,
As he sold himself for sixpence an hour:
"This is my own, my native land"?
From the March 1917 issue of the Socialist Standard
Breathes there a man with soul so dead —
Some modern slave at factory gate
Who never to himself hath said,
In cynic bitterness and hate:
"This is my own, my native land"
Breathes there a man with soul so dead —
A numbered hand in a factory hell
Who never to himself hath said,
When hurried to toil by the factory bell:
"This is my own, my native land"?
Breathes there a man with soul so dead
Mocked by flaunted wealth and power
Who never to himself hath said,
As he sold himself for sixpence an hour:
"This is my own, my native land"?
1 comment:
I. Patriotism
“Breathes there the man?”
Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832)
From “The Lay of the Last Minstrel,” Canto VI.
BREATHES there the man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land!
Whose heart has ne’er within him burned,
As home his footsteps he hath turned 5
From wandering on a foreign strand?
If such there breathe, go, mark him well;
For him no minstrel raptures swell;
High though his titles, proud his name,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim, 10
Despite those titles, power, and pelf,
The wretch, concentred all in self,
Living, shall forfeit fair renown,
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust from whence he sprung, 15
Unwept, unhonored, and unsung.
===================
Felicitations to the "unsung" comrade,
like a good materialist,
returned to the planet's dust.
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