<h2><SPAN name="page84"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>AWAKENED!</h2>
<p class="poetry">Slowly the People waken; they have been,<br/>
Like weary soldiers, sleeping in their tents,<br/>
While traitors tiptoed through the silent camp<br/>
Intent on plunder. Suddenly a sound—<br/>
A careless movement of too bold a thief—<br/>
Starts one dull sleeper; then another stirs,<br/>
A third cries out a warning, and at last<br/>
The people are awake! Oh, when as one<br/>
The many rise, united and alert,<br/>
With Justice for their motto, they reflect<br/>
The mighty force of God’s Omnipotence.<br/>
And nothing stands before them. Lusty Greed,<br/>
Tyrannical Corruption long in power,<br/>
And smirking Cant (whose right hand robs and slays<br/>
So that the left may dower Church and School),<br/>
Monopoly, whose mandate took from Toil<br/>
The Mother Earth, that Idleness might loll<br/>
<SPAN name="page85"></SPAN><span class="pagenum"></span>And breed
the Monster of Colossal Wealth—<br/>
All these must fall before the gathering Force<br/>
Of public indignation. That old strife<br/>
Which marks the progress of each century,<br/>
The war of Right with Might, is on once more,<br/>
And shame to him who does not take his stand.</p>
<p class="poetry">This is the weightiest moment of all time,<br/>
And on the issues of the present hour<br/>
A nation’s honour and a country’s peace,<br/>
A People’s future, ay, a World’s, depends.</p>
<p class="poetry">Until the vital questions of the day<br/>
Are solved and settled, and the spendthrift thieves<br/>
Who rob the coffers of the saving poor<br/>
Are led from fashion’s feasts to prison fare,<br/>
And taught the saving grace of honest work—<br/>
Till Labour claims the privilege of toil<br/>
And toil the proceeds of its labour shares—<br/>
Let no man sleep, let no man dare to sleep!</p>
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