Just as meaningful today as when written

“The Gods of the Copybook Headings” is a poem written and published by Rudyard Kipling in 1919. Kipling’s editor, Andrew Rutherford said that the poem contained “age-old, unfashionable wisdom” that Kipling saw as having been forgotten by society and replaced by “habits of wishful thinking.” The central message of the poem is that basic and unvarying aspects of human nature will always re-emerge in every society (The Four Turnings of Strauss and Howe) previously discussed on this blog. This is a very fitting piece of artistic work to be inserted here as we are going though what Kipling wrote about almost one hundred years ago again, we have learned nothing.

The copybook headings to which the title refers were proverbs or maxims printed at the top of 19th century British schoolboys’ notebook pages; these books were called “copybooks.” The students had to write the the heading on each page by hand (not print) repeatedly down that page. There were two reasons for the education system (not yet corrupted by the progressives) doing this.  One was to prefect handwriting, for practice makes perfect. The other was to ingrain in the students things that would benefit them later in life.

One hundred years ago as again today we that thrown out all the things that use to be taught which went a long way to make up the moral fiber of a society for example he have the following:

A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush
A chain is only as strong as its weakest link
A day’s work for a day’s pay
A fool and his money are soon parted
A house divided against itself cannot stand
The Gods of the Copybook Headings

AS I PASS through my incarnations in every age and race,
I make my proper prostrations to the Gods of the Market Place.
Peering through reverent fingers I watch them flourish and fall,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings, I notice, outlast them all.

We were living in trees when they met us. They showed us each in turn
That Water would certainly wet us, as Fire would certainly burn:
But we found them lacking in Uplift, Vision and Breadth of Mind,
So we left them to teach the Gorillas while we followed the March of Mankind.

We moved as the Spirit listed. They never altered their pace,
Being neither cloud nor wind-borne like the Gods of the Market Place,
But they always caught up with our progress, and presently word would come
That a tribe had been wiped off its icefield, or the lights had gone out in Rome.

With the Hopes that our World is built on they were utterly out of touch,
They denied that the Moon was Stilton; they denied she was even Dutch;
They denied that Wishes were Horses; they denied that a Pig had Wings;
So we worshipped the Gods of the Market Who promised these beautiful things.

When the Cambrian measures were forming, They promised perpetual peace.
They swore, if we gave them our weapons, that the wars of the tribes would cease.
But when we disarmed They sold us and delivered us bound to our foe,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: “Stick to the Devil you know.”

On the first Feminian Sandstones we were promised the Fuller Life
Which started by loving our neighbor and ended by loving his wife
Till our women had no more children and the men lost reason and faith,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: “The Wages of Sin is Death.”

In the Carboniferous Epoch we were promised abundance for all,
By robbing selected Peter to pay for collective Paul;
But, though we had plenty of money, there was nothing our money could buy,
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings said: “If you don’t work you die.”

Then the Gods of the Market tumbled, and their smooth-tongued wizards withdrew
And the hearts of the meanest were humbled and began to believe it was true
That All is not Gold that Glitters, and Two and Two make Four
And the Gods of the Copybook Headings limped up to explain it once more.

As it will be in the future, it was at the birth of Man
There are only four things certain since Social Progress began.
That the Dog returns to his Vomit and the Sow returns to her Mire,
And the burnt Fool’s bandaged finger goes wabbling back to the Fire;

And that after this is accomplished, and the brave new world begins
When all men are paid for existing and no man must pay for his sins,
As surely as Water will wet us, as surely as Fire will burn,
The Gods of the Copybook Headings with terror and slaughter return!

Read a previous post listed in my section Civil Society titled “Homeostasis and Civil Society The Destruction of the American Family” for an example of what must be held important along with the dangers of forgetting what works for the sake of personal pleasures as shown is this poem by Kipling.