University of Virginia Library

1  WITH antecedents;
With my fathers and mothers, and the accumulations      of past ages;
With all which, had it not been, I would not now be      here, as I am:
With Egypt, India, Phenicia, Greece and Rome;
With the Kelt, the Scandinavian, the Alb, and the      Saxon;
With antique maritime ventures, — with laws, artizan-     ship, wars and journeys;
With the poet, the skald, the saga, the myth, and the      oracle;
With the sale of slaves — with enthusiasts — with the      troubadour, the crusader, and the monk;
With those old continents whence we have come to this      new continent;
With the fading kingdoms and kings over there;
With the fading religions and priests;
With the small shores we look back to from our own      large and present shores;
With countless years drawing themselves onward, and      arrived at these years;
You and Me arrived — America arrived, and making      this year;
This year! sending itself ahead countless years to      come.
2   O but it is not the years — it is I — it is You;
We touch all laws, and tally all antecedents;
We are the skald, the oracle, the monk, and the      knight — we easily include them, and more;
We stand amid time, beginningless and endless — we      stand amid evil and good;
All swings around us — there is as much darkness as      light;
The very sun swings itself and its system of planets      around us:
Its sun, and its again, all swing around us.
3  As for me, (torn, stormy, even as I, amid these ve-     hement days;)
I have the idea of all, and am all, and believe in all;
I believe materialism is true, and spiritualism is true —      I reject no part.
4  Have I forgotten any part?
Come to me, whoever and whatever, till I give you      recognition.
5  I respect Assyria, China, Teutonia, and the He-     brews;
I adopt each theory, myth, god, and demi-god;
I see that the old accounts, bibles, genealogies, are      true, without exception;
I assert that all past days were what they should have      been;
And that they could no-how have been better than      they were,
And that to-day is what it should be — and that      America is,
And that to-day and America could no-how be better      than they are.
6  In the name of These States, and in your and my      name, the Past,
And in the name of These States, and in your and my      name, the Present time.
7  I know that the past was great, and the future will      be great,
And I know that both curiously conjoint in the pres-     ent time,
(For the sake of him I typify — for the common aver-     age man's sake — your sake, if you are he;)
And that where I am, or you are, this present day,      there is the centre of all days, all races,
And there is the meaning, to us, of all that has ever      come of races and days, or ever will come.