What I Live For

I LIVE for those who love me,
 Whose hearts are kind and true,
For heaven that smiles above me,
 And waits my spirit, too;
For all the ties that bind me,        
For all the tasks assigned me,
And bright hopes left behind me,
 And good that I can do.

I live to learn their story
 Who’ve suffered for my sake,        
To emulate their glory,
 And follow in their wake;
Bards, patriots, martyrs, sages,
The noble of all ages,
Whose deeds crown history’s pages,        
 And Time’s great volume make.

I live to hold communion
 With all that is divine,
To feel there is a union
 ’Twixt Nature’s heart and mine;        
To profit by affliction,
Reap truths from fields of fiction,
And, wiser from conviction,
 Fulfil each grand design.

I live to hail that season,        
 By gifted minds foretold,
When men shall rule by reason,
 And not alone by gold;
When man to man united,
And every wrong thing righted,        
The whole world shall be lighted
 As Eden was of old.

I live for those who love me,
 Whose hearts are kind and true,
For heaven that smiles above me,        
 And waits my spirit too;
For the cause that lacks assistance,
For the wrong that needs resistance,
For the future in the distance,
 And the good that I can do.        

George Linnæus Banks (1821–1881)