"A Psalm of Life" by Longfellow

What the heart of the young man said to the psalmist:
TELL me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream ! —
For the soul is dead that slumbers,
And things are not what they seem.


Life is real ! Life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal ;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.


Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,
Is our destined end or way ;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us farther than to-day.


Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave,
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.


In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle !
Be a hero in the strife !


Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant !
Let the dead Past bury its dead !
Act,— act in the living Present !
Heart within, and God o'erhead !


Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time ;


Footprints, that perhaps another,
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.


Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate ;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labor and to wait.

--Henry Wadsworth Longfellow


I think Longfellow doesn't get enough credit. I remember the first time I suspected that I didn't want to become an English professor: I was 20, majoring in English literature, and talking to a grad student about his experiences. He was explaining how literary criticism takes theories and paradigms and applies them to existing texts, and that's how you can write new things about old works. I had recently discovered this poem and I loved it, and so I asked all excitedly about Longfellow - what did he think of that poet? The guy just kind of laughed and said no, no one studied Longfellow - way too cheesy.

What? Why on earth not? And thus became my first introduction to the idea of fads and trends and fashions in scholarship, and thus began my first disillusionment with it. The whole point of scholarship was that it takes the long view; the studies are for the ages; it isn't immediately used and so it doesn't have to be of the current age. English literature scholarship meant a happy existence of reading what you want and thinking about it and sharing your thoughts on it. Uh, no. That's not how it works. Not if you want someone else to pay you for it. Academia is just as much tied to fashions and trends and human frailties as the garment industry. I had no idea! That began the process of me considering that if I didn't tie my financial security to the products of my thinky thoughts, then I could still read and study whatever I want.

That has its own downsides: mostly, I have to work full time and only get this part time. The big tragedy of life is opportunity cost, and there is cost either way. I gave up even trying to be a professional scholar, and instead I pay tuition, I haven't published a book of anything yet, and I'm not as good as I could have been. On the upside, I don't worry about money and I can read whatever I want. Plus, I don't have to fight the bigotry against Mormons just to secure rent for the next year. Asking for a place in a system means accepting the rules of the system, and those rules are not tolerable for me. Apparently. So I lurk on the outside and try not to be lazy and hope for a seat at the table. And I love Longfellow.