Page:Poems Geisse.djvu/42

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GIVING ADVICE.
The easiest task
That a mortal can find,
And pleasing, I think,
To the average mind,

Is giving advice,
For I need not explain,
That it does not require
A surplus of brain.

You see it is easy,
So easy to mend
The fortunes or faults
Of our neighbors and friends.

We would do thus and so
Had fate placed us like them,
We complacently say,
When we judge and condemn.

And we frequently show ourselves
Narrow and mean,
As censure grows fat,
And compassion grows lean.

But we never can know
How we really would act,
Since theory is always
So different from fact.

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