| |
| LET not our town be large—remembering |
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| That little Athens was the Muses’ home; |
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| That Oxford rules the heart of London still, |
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| That Florence gave the Renaissance to Rome. |
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| |
| Record it for the grandson of your son— |
5 |
| A city is not builded in a day: |
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| Our little town cannot complete her soul |
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| Till countless generations pass away. |
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| |
| Now let each child be joined as to a church |
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| To her perpetual hopes, each man ordained; |
10 |
| Let every street be made a reverent aisle |
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| Where music grows, and beauty is unchained. |
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| |
| Let Science and Machinery and Trade |
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| Be slaves of her, and make her all in all— |
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| Building against our blatant restless time |
15 |
| An unseen, skillful, mediæval wall. |
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| |
| Let every citizen be rich toward God. |
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| Let Christ, the beggar, teach divinity— |
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| Let no man rule who holds his money dear. |
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| Let this, our city, be our luxury. |
20 |
| |
| We should build parks that students from afar |
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| Would choose to starve in, rather than go home— |
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| Fair little squares, with Phidian ornament— |
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| Food for the spirit, milk and honeycomb. |
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| |
| Songs shall be sung by us in that good day— |
25 |
| Songs we have written—blood within the rhyme |
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| Beating, as when old England still was glad, |
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| The purple, rich, Elizabethan time. |
|
| |
| Say, is my prophecy too fair and far? |
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| I only know, unless her faith be high, |
30 |
| The soul of this our Nineveh is doomed, |
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| Our little Babylon will surely die. |
|
| |
| Some city on the breast of Illinois |
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| No wiser and no better at the start, |
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| By faith shall rise redeemed—by faith shall rise |
35 |
| Bearing the western glory in her heart— |
|
| |
| The genius of the Maple, Elm and Oak, |
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| The secret hidden in each grain of corn— |
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| The glory that the prairie angels sing |
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| At night when sons of Life and Love are born— |
40 |
| |
| Born but to struggle, squalid and alone, |
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| Broken and wandering in their early years. |
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| When will they make our dusty streets their goal, |
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| Within our attics hide their sacred tears? |
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| |
| When will they start our vulgar blood athrill |
45 |
| With living language—words that set us free? |
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| When will they make a path of beauty clear |
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| Between our riches and our liberty? |
|
| |
| We must have many Lincoln-hearted men— |
|
| A city is not builded in a day— |
50 |
| And they must do their work, and come and go |
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| While countless generations pass away. |
