Skyline Riders and Other Verses

The World is Full of Kindness

Henry Lawson


THE WORLD is full of kindness—
    And not the poor alone;
We Christians in our blindness
    Bow down to hearts of stone;
The clever, bitter cynic,
    Whose poisoned “soul” is dead,
And, like the rotten clinic,
    Raves, helpless, on his bed.

The world is full of kindness—
    But not the White alone;
The heathen in his blindness
    Bows down to wood and stone;
But all men are his brothers,
    In spite of all the “Powers,”
And the things he does for others
    Shew whiter souls than ours.

The world is full of kindness—
    But not the Lean alone;
The Fat man in his blindness
    Bows down, and not to stone;
But when a friend’s in trouble,
    And an honest friend at that,
Then I’d turn to the Fat man
    In spite of all his fat.

The world is full of kindness
    If it is let alone,
And men’s hearts in their blindness
    Are neither ice nor stone.
In spite of all pretences,
    We get it from Above;
In spite of all defences—
    Red blood, kind hearts, and love.


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