Sweet virtue, virtue, virtue! — what a start
You've got here in this city's feverish heart!
There isn't a thing to do that's square and right,
But some one's here to teach it, day and night;
No soothing balm soul may from soul demand,
But some one has it ready to his hand!
And then the churches — thick and rich of yield,
As corn-shocks in a new-made prairie field,
Where any one the golden fruit can find
All ready cooked to suit his heart and mind;
Great brick-and-mortar prayers! that never cease,
And costing fifty good-sized farms apiece
(Much too expensive, it might well be said,
If bodies only need be clothed and fed).
And then the missions — regular district schools,
Where transient men are taught eternal rules:
Then the Salvation Army girls and boys,
Who season their religion up with noise,
And, when they get to Heaven, won't have the power
To help keep silent even half an hour:
But who take ragged wretches every day,
Haul them into the straight and narrow way,
Strip them of vain conceit soon as they show it,
And get them saved — almost before they know it!
It's something good to make these people good,
Who never go to church, and never would!
God bless each woman, man, and child, I say,
That leads His creatures in the heavenly way,
Whether they work by still, old-fashioned means,
Or march with drums and flags and tambourines!
Then there's those men who've crept and crawled as low
As even Satan cared to have them go;
Have marched through strong iron doors in striped ranks,
Have toiled where convict-labor whirls and clanks,
Have made hard beds in cramped and lonely cells,
Have sinned their way through several different hells;
Whose lives have been too terribly amiss
To ever find worse worlds than they've made this;
Then groped out into Virtue's bath and sun,
And been washed up as clean as any one,
And warmed up with sweet sunlight from above
Till they themselves start off on deeds of love,
And say to men with scarred and crime flushed brow.
" I've been as bad, or worse, than you are now. "
Whereat the wretch says, with dull, shadowy bliss,
" What! can there be some square way out of this? "
And maybe brings to pass, through Virtue's schemes,
Some of his poor old mother's fondest dreams!
You've got here in this city's feverish heart!
There isn't a thing to do that's square and right,
But some one's here to teach it, day and night;
No soothing balm soul may from soul demand,
But some one has it ready to his hand!
And then the churches — thick and rich of yield,
As corn-shocks in a new-made prairie field,
Where any one the golden fruit can find
All ready cooked to suit his heart and mind;
Great brick-and-mortar prayers! that never cease,
And costing fifty good-sized farms apiece
(Much too expensive, it might well be said,
If bodies only need be clothed and fed).
And then the missions — regular district schools,
Where transient men are taught eternal rules:
Then the Salvation Army girls and boys,
Who season their religion up with noise,
And, when they get to Heaven, won't have the power
To help keep silent even half an hour:
But who take ragged wretches every day,
Haul them into the straight and narrow way,
Strip them of vain conceit soon as they show it,
And get them saved — almost before they know it!
It's something good to make these people good,
Who never go to church, and never would!
God bless each woman, man, and child, I say,
That leads His creatures in the heavenly way,
Whether they work by still, old-fashioned means,
Or march with drums and flags and tambourines!
Then there's those men who've crept and crawled as low
As even Satan cared to have them go;
Have marched through strong iron doors in striped ranks,
Have toiled where convict-labor whirls and clanks,
Have made hard beds in cramped and lonely cells,
Have sinned their way through several different hells;
Whose lives have been too terribly amiss
To ever find worse worlds than they've made this;
Then groped out into Virtue's bath and sun,
And been washed up as clean as any one,
And warmed up with sweet sunlight from above
Till they themselves start off on deeds of love,
And say to men with scarred and crime flushed brow.
" I've been as bad, or worse, than you are now. "
Whereat the wretch says, with dull, shadowy bliss,
" What! can there be some square way out of this? "
And maybe brings to pass, through Virtue's schemes,
Some of his poor old mother's fondest dreams!