The World’s Great Want

From the Rock Island Argus, March 19, 1913.
 By S. E. Kiser.
 

 They are trying to arrange it so that man may safely fly;
 They are trying to learn more about the stars up in the sky;
 They are digging up old ruins so that each of us may know
 What people did for pleasure and for profit long ago;
 Here and there is some one trying to revive the love of art,
 Here and there some poet bravely sings a song that’s from the heart.
 But away with art and science and the Babylonian brick,
 What we want is some sure way in which to Get Rich Quick.
 
 Men are fighting still for freedom, fighting still to have the right
 To address their God unhindered when they kneel to pray at night;
 They are chafing ‘neath oppression as their fathers did before,
 They are tugging at the fetters which their luckless parents wore;
 Here and there some man arises and attempts to let us know
 How to make fair peace forever the sweet mistress here below,
 But we have no time to bother over such affairs; we stick
 To the hope of finding ways in which to Get Rich Quick.
 
 The preachers keep on preaching of the glories over there
 Where the boodlers cease from troubling and the prospects all are fair;
 The anxious, eager doctors keep on striving to defy
 Grim Nature and arrange it so that people needn’t die;
 But away with all the dreamers and the foolish ones who preach.
 Who cares what the stars are made of, or what ancient tablets teach?
 We are looking for the hero who will show us all the trick,
 Who will kindly point the way in which to Get Rich Quick.