To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them; "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings--nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,
And--which is more--you'll be a Man, my son!


_Rudyard Kipling._

From "Rudyard Kipling's Verse, 1885-1918."




INVICTUS


Triumph in spirit over adverse conditions is the keynote of this poem of
courage undismayed. It rings with the power of the individual to guide
his own destiny.


Out of the night that covers me,