Glory to Man in the highest! for Man is the master of things.

A creed is a rod,/ And a crown is of night:/ But this thing is God:/ To be man with thy might,/ To grow straight in the strength of thy spirit, and live out thy life as the light.

Before the beginning of years/ There came to the making of man/ Time with a gift of tears,/ Grief with a glass that ran.

From too much love of living, From hope and fear set free, We thank with brief thanksgiving Whatever gods may be That no life lives for ever; That dead men rise up never; That even the weariest river Winds somewhere safe to sea.

This I ever held worse that all certitude, To know not what the worst ahead might be.

Time turns the old days to derision, our loves into corpses or wives; and marriage and death and division make barren our lives.