‘Hurry up!’ No lingering by old doors of doubt— No loitering by the way, No waiting a To-morrow car, When you can board To-day. Success is somewhere down the track; Before the chance is gone Accelerate your laggard pace, Swing on, I say, swing on— Hurry up!
‘Step lively!’ Belated souls are following fast, They shout and signal, ‘Wait.’ Conductor Time brooks no delay, He rings the bell of Fate. But you can give the man behind, With one hand on the bar, A final chance to brook defeat, And board the moving car. Step lively!
‘Move up!’ Make way for others as you sit Or stand. This crowded earth Has room for every journeying soul En route to higher birth. Ay, room and comfort, if no one Took double share or space, Nor let his greed and selfishness Absorb another’s place. Move up!
‘Hold fast!’ The jolting switch of obstacles With jarring rails is near. Stand firm of foot, be strong of grip, Brace well and have no fear. The Maker of the Car of Life Foresaw that curve—Despair, And hung the straps of faith, and hope So you might grasp them there. Hold fast!
Send forth your heart’s desire, and work and wait; The opportunities of life are brought To our own doors, not by capricious fate, But by the strong compelling force of thought.
The wonderful age of the world I sing— The age of battery, coil and spring, Of steam, and storage, and motored thing.
Though faith may slumber and art seem dead, And all that is spoken has once been said, And all that is written were best unread;
Though hearts are iron and thoughts are steel, And all that has value is mercantile, Yet marvellous truths shall the age reveal.
Ay, greater the marvels this age shall find Than all the centuries left behind, When faith was a bigot and art was blind.
Oh, sorry the search of the world for gods, Through faith that slaughters and art that lauds, While reason sits on its throne and nods.
But out of the leisure that men will know, When the cruel things of the sad earth go, A Faith that is Knowledge shall rise and grow.
In the throb and whir of each new machine Thinner is growing the veil between The visible earth and the worlds unseen.
The True Religion shall leisure bring; And Art shall awaken and Love shall sing: Oh, ho! for the age of the motored thing!