The White Pine news. [volume] (Ely, Nev.) 1906-1910, 1907-10-07
THE THREE ROADS.

dI the SNOWY peak
OF Fame, then at the youth, and So
berly did speak:
H.
My son. he said with quavering
voice. with hating broken
speech,
Your choice must be but yours
alone, and you alone can reach
Your own decision and select the path
that you would tread
Henceforth Unaided you must
choose. None other in your
stead
Can solve the fateful problem of this
moment and this day;
But | perhaps can offer some hint as
to the way
Whether to diZzying heights of Fame
that you would bear your load,
Or to Oblivion's deep abyss, or on the
Middle Road.
Note well these roads that here di-
vide, like fingers of hand
You plainly see them for space. On
each there is band
OF travellers. But mark you well the
difference in the crowds
How many in the lower paths, how
few strive toward the clouds
That hover DER the mountain top;
those of mediocre aim
Trudge carelessly the Middle Path
their thoughts are all the same
But the great mad mob is hurrying
down Oblivion's broad road
To utter dark forgetfulness. their
perpetual abode.
".
ITO take this path is easiest. Com
panions day by day
Will help to guide your fleeting step
and point to you the way.
OF these are Sloth and Incidence
| loutish, knavish twins
Who march hand in hand with Ape
tite and other kindred sins.
The path itself at first is green, with
| flowers on every hand
But soon the embowered road is lost
| in wastes of desert sand.
This is the path the mob will take
the line of resistance least
And as water seeks its level, they
seek the level of the beast.
V.
THE travellers on the Middle Road
are neither good nor bad;
Their pleasures walk beside them
sometimes their hearts are sad
Commonplace joys, commonplace
griefs, commonplace hopes anC
fears,
Average toll and average rest marx
the succeeding years.
Sometimes they look with a passing
glance at the misery down below
Or admire perhaps, in envy, Fame!
crest of perpetual snow.
Theirs is the common lot of Man
theirs is the common strife;
Theirs is the simple easy path their:
is the common life.
VI.
Now turn your gaze to the noun
tain top and note it's towering
height, Ev
Which reflects the earliest sunshine
ray, while below it still is night
Few of the travellers ever seek tina
crest of ice and snow,
But fewer far are those who attain
nor fall in the depths below.
Care and Toll and Ambition are the
guides that ever seek
To aid the strong and manly soul.
who strive for the glitterinf
peak.
On the broad plateau of Prominence
half way to the mountain top
The greater number of those who
start, with Self Satisfaction stop
VII.
Above that point the SHOWS de
scend; the atmosphere cold an(
chill.
Daunts the many. The few who e
on with brave and hardy will
Must achieve alone, for borrowed
strength will not help them tt
ascend
And each who aspires must DO alone
to gain the desired end.
The feathery snow like a weavine
shroud falls on one and all
And for those whose hearts are eve
alone, forms burying pail
These have attained to what they as
pired, they stand on the crest o.
Fame
Like marble statues, or statues O.
bronze-with everlasting name,
VIII.
THE few whose hearts hold compan
ionship with those whom the,
deeply love
Who are loved in return full ane
complete, find the icy path above
! Strewn with roses and violets, tnt
fairest blossoms of Spring,
And as together they upward ioil
they laugh and smile and sing.
The snowflakes that fall on the lionel,
hearts forming shroud and pail
Are melted to mist of kindness ever
as they fall
For hand in hand each toll and strive
each with identical aim,
That one of the two may achieve anG
gain his need of undying Fame!