Looking for "If you can keep your head while all around you are loosing theirs...etc...then all of heaven and earth will be yours... and what's more you'll be a man my son"

greenspun.com : LUSENET : Poetry : One Thread

Can someone tell me the name of this poem or, better still tell me where I can get the text of it. I find it inspiring!

-- Carl (marceliswallis@yahoo.com), December 20, 1998

Answers

IF--

by Rudyard Kipling

If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you; If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you But make allowance for their doubting too; If you can wait and not be tired by waiting; Or being lied about, don't deal in lies, Or, being hated, don't give way to hating; And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream--and not make dreams your master; If you can think--and not make thoughts your aim; If you can meet with triumph and disaster And treat those two impostors just the same; If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build 'em up with wornout tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings And never breathe a word about your loss; If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew 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!

-- ilza (ilza@pobox.com), February 15, 1999.


The poem is If by Rudyard Kipling You will find the text in any library and that will give you the opportunity of looking at othewr great works by him such as Jungle Book which wasn't written by Disney after all!! I suggest a search on yahoo will turn up a page with it on. Failing that, drop me a line and I will scan it in.

-- Chesil (chesil@enterprise.net), December 23, 1998.

Moderation questions? read the FAQ