There is no harm in pure imagination;

Build as you please your Hell and Paradise, But yet respect the laws of gravitation

If you must bring your castles from the skies. If Nature knows from law no deviation,

Where is the fancy firmer base supplies? Swing on, Old World, safe in unchanging laws, And never once for pigmy Joshua pause!

Wriggley's Religion, Horlick's Malted Morals, Uneeda Faith, and Gorton's Boneless Creed,—

Each, by the maker praised and crowned with laurels, Is thrust into the public maw with speed.

Infringement of the trade-marks causes quarrels: A heavenly "pure-food law" is what we need;

But even Knox's oatmeal porridge would

Be better than this pre-digested food.

Deny that we of God have knowledge clear;

Deny that Christ is anything but man; Deny of Heaven the hope and Hell the fear;

And doubt the universe a God-like plan,— Would anything be lost that we hold dear?

Primordial force will on as best it can: Love lips will kiss and seasons greet the sun When our beliefs are lost and our race run.

Much mused Chaldea on the starry sky,

The sands have buried Ur, the stars still shine;

Though Jove was throned upon Olympus high, The mystic mount now pastures peasants' kine;

To the great sun the Aztec raised his cry, His morning beams break on no Aztec shrine.

Unstained forever stands the eternal glass,

Reflecting nations as the ages pass.

Before the mirror pigmies mow and chatter, Or scared at their own image stand in awe.

One little wretch the clear, deep glass would smatter By flinging filth from his small, dirty paw.

A little maniac would the mirror shatter,

But still it stands unstained, without a flaw.

Could the poor gazer grow divine, all-wise,

A God-like image then might greet his eyes.

Uncounted ages scarce have taught the race To know itself in body and in mind.

Man yet triumphant over time and space

May know the truth and know it unconfined.

Our greatest myst'ries may seem common-place When rolling years have left them far behind:

Our forbears, a la Darwin, no less knew

Of present truths than future truths do you.

Not unto those star-watchers of the night;

Not unto us who know that night is done; But for the child that wakes with morning light

Shall in full glory shine the efTulgent sun. We learn each hour more of wrong and right,

Push on in faith, the fight may yet be won: And aeons hence, in spring-time, flowers will bloom, And Love and Life be glad above our tomb.

The Gentle Reader asks us our intention,

If still he's gentle and is yet awake. He thinks we rail at everything we mention,

And designate what we dislike a fake. The doctor to disease must give attention:

A wrong is often simply a mistake. "Whatever is, is right," is truth that lacks The backing of plain common sense and facts.

One need not be a Socialist to claim

The Guggenheims want much that most have lacked:

One need not be an Atheist to blame

The Church that states a miracle as fact;

Nor are men Anarchists who think it shame Our tariff law by gold and greed is backed.

Since Common-sense proves Paladino faking,

Perhaps there's common sense, too, in muck raking.

This good old World is full of good for man.

Health, food, and clothes, with leisure, is enough; And Common-sense long since drew up a plan

Which anyone may follow in the rough. A dose of Fletcherism's better than

A dose of Pills for those who eat and stuff*. Play Golf, not Poker, water drink and then Add "Peace on Earth and right Good-Will to men."

Peace on this Earth, Good-Will to all Mankind Still sounds the sweetest song to mortal ears.

Our earth-born race must on the old Earth find Its present joys and future hopes and fears.

It's still the greatest feat of human mind To help the needy, dry the orphan's tears.

Health, food, and leisure most of men will prize

As pleasant prelude to a Paradise.

And if a star-dust theory you must find,

(Jove, Allah, Zeus, or Wells' composite mess)

Reach out through space and time with eager mind, Nor fear to hope what Einstein can't express.

But never leave Old Earth too far behind Time never makes Eternity the less,

If we can only open up our eyes,

Mayhap we'll find our Globe near Paradise.

And if the Earth is not a paradise,

It is the best that man has ever known.

The dreamer who on Heaven fixed his eyes Fell in a ditch by stumbling o'er a stone.

For just plain common-sense our misery cries; The Future for the Present can't atone.

Our greatest minds would better ponder well

Ryan's "Living Wage" than whether there's a Hell.

And thus "Pursuit of Happiness," my theme, "Still like the circle bounding earth and skies,"

Now there to you and here to me may seem, "Allures from far and as I follow flies."

But to the ocean comes at last the stream; On the horizon Truth at last will rise.

Writ on the goal where all their searchings cease

Mankind will read, "Good-Will, to all Earth Peace."