George Frederick Cameron: Is it true greatness to lead armed hirelings on to bleed?

Anti-war essays, poems, short stories and literary excerpts

George Frederick Cameron
True Greatness

What is true greatness? Is ’t to climb
Above the rocks and shoals of time
To sculpture on some height sublime
A name
To live immortal in its prime
And flush of fame?

What is true greatness? Is ’t to lead
Your armèd hirelings on to bleed,
And move a terrible god, indeed,
An hour;
To sate your lust of gold, or greed
Of despot power?

What is true greatness? Question not,
But go to yon secluded spot
And enter yonder humble cot
And find
A husbandman who never fought
Or wronged his kind:

For whom the lips of war are dumb:
Who loves far more than beat of drum
The cattle’s low, the insect’s hum
In air:
And find true greatness in its sum
And total there!

What is true Greatness? ’Tis to clear
From sorrow’s eye the glistening tear:
To comfort there, to cherish here,
To bless:
To aid, encourage, and to cheer
Distress.

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