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Kipling’s War Poem
For all we have and are,
For all our children’s fate.
Stand up and meet the war -
The Hun is at the gate.
Our world has passed away
In wanton overthrow;
These’s nothing left to-day
But steel and fire and woe.
Though all we know depart,
The old commandments stand:
In courage keep your heart!
In strength lift up your hand!
Once more we hear the word
That sickened earth of old:
No law except the sword,
Unsheathed and uncontrolled.
Once more, it knits mankind,
Once more the nations go
To meet and break and bind
A crazed and driven foe.
Comfort, content, delight,
The age’s slow-bought gain,
They shrivelled in a night-
Only ourselves remain.
To face the naked days
In silent fortitude,
Through perils and dismays
Renewed and re-renewed.
Though all we made depart,
The old commandments stand:
In patience keep your heart!
In strength lift up your hand!
No easy hopes or lies
Shall bring us to our goal –
But iron sacrifice
Of body, will and soul.
There’s but one task for all,
For each one life to give;
Who stands if freedom fall?
Who dies if England live?
For all we have and are,
For all our children’s fate.
Stand up and meet the war -
The Hun is at the gate.
Our world has passed away
In wanton overthrow;
These’s nothing left to-day
But steel and fire and woe.
Though all we know depart,
The old commandments stand:
In courage keep your heart!
In strength lift up your hand!
Once more we hear the word
That sickened earth of old:
No law except the sword,
Unsheathed and uncontrolled.
Once more, it knits mankind,
Once more the nations go
To meet and break and bind
A crazed and driven foe.
Comfort, content, delight,
The age’s slow-bought gain,
They shrivelled in a night-
Only ourselves remain.
To face the naked days
In silent fortitude,
Through perils and dismays
Renewed and re-renewed.
Though all we made depart,
The old commandments stand:
In patience keep your heart!
In strength lift up your hand!
No easy hopes or lies
Shall bring us to our goal –
But iron sacrifice
Of body, will and soul.
There’s but one task for all,
For each one life to give;
Who stands if freedom fall?
Who dies if England live?
Published Sept 10, 1914
Aylmer Express Newspaper
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Frank’s connection to Rudyard Kipling
1907 Oct 27 Montreal (McGill University)
135 Hutchison St
Dear Mother “et al”,-
It is so late that I will only have time for a very short letter this week. As usual there is nothing of especial importance happening although we did have a little diversion from the ordinary last week. This was a speech from Rudyard Kipling, the great poet.
He gave a special address to McGill students, we being favored because he is an L.L.D. of McGill. He gave a good address and then when he came out of the Hall the fellows captured a cab and induced him to get in. Then we unhooked the horse and pulled him down town and then back up to Sir Wm Van Horne’s residence where he is stopping. I’ll bet he never seen a wilder lot of chaps nor heard more noise even when he was in South Africa with the soldiers.
He struck me as rather a disappointment. He is very short and the little that is left is very much crooked. He dresses very plainly and his over coat was really shabby. I expected to see a larger man and at least one pretty dressy especially when one considers that he is often the guest of the King & Queen of Eng. and also of other monarchs and all the aristocracy wherever he goes. I think I shall appreciate his poetry more in the future than I have in the past… Love, Frank
135 Hutchison St
Dear Mother “et al”,-
It is so late that I will only have time for a very short letter this week. As usual there is nothing of especial importance happening although we did have a little diversion from the ordinary last week. This was a speech from Rudyard Kipling, the great poet.
He gave a special address to McGill students, we being favored because he is an L.L.D. of McGill. He gave a good address and then when he came out of the Hall the fellows captured a cab and induced him to get in. Then we unhooked the horse and pulled him down town and then back up to Sir Wm Van Horne’s residence where he is stopping. I’ll bet he never seen a wilder lot of chaps nor heard more noise even when he was in South Africa with the soldiers.
He struck me as rather a disappointment. He is very short and the little that is left is very much crooked. He dresses very plainly and his over coat was really shabby. I expected to see a larger man and at least one pretty dressy especially when one considers that he is often the guest of the King & Queen of Eng. and also of other monarchs and all the aristocracy wherever he goes. I think I shall appreciate his poetry more in the future than I have in the past… Love, Frank
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In this year, 1907, Rudyard Kipling became the first Englishman to receive the Nobel Prize for literature and as evidence by Frank’s letter home presented the convocation address to McGill University.
Below is a glimpse into that Convocation Hall, October, 1907.
"You will be confronted by an organized conspiracy which will try to make you believe that the world is governed by the idea of wealth for wealth's sake, and that all means which lead to the accumulation of that wealth are, if not laudable, at least expedient. You will live and eat and move and have your being in a world dominated by that thought. Some of you will probably succumb to the poison of it.
One day you'll meet someone for whom [money] means very little. I suggest that you watch him closely, for he will demonstrate to you that money dominates everybody except the man who does not want money. But be sure that, whenever and wherever you meet him, his little finger will be thicker than your loins." Rudyard Kipling
http://www.mcgill.ca/reporter/33/16/past/ The Ghosts of Convocations Past – McGill Reporter May 10, 2001, Volume 33 number 12
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