Am I waking or sleeping, in Congress or bed?
Do I stand on my feet? am I poised on my head?
Has the world gone to smash? is it chaos that reigns?
Or have I somehow lost a grip of my brains?
There’s something gone wrong which I cannot make out,
The people don’t know what on earth they’re about;
There is woe in our camp and dismay in our tents,
For no longer we rule with our dollars and cents.
Has the crispy bank-note lost its wonderful powers?
Are the lives and the souls of the people not ours?
Fame’s ladder saw us on the top, and you know
That muscle and brain were contented below;
Leastways, if they murmured, a handful of gold
Could buy up the weak or could crush out the bold,
For a very small gift from our riches contents
The outcast who hasn’t got dollars and cents.
But now there’s a muttering startling and strange
From the lowermost depths, a demand for a change,
A really absurd and ridiculous plan
To ostracize gold and to dignify man;
The base common herd won’t submit any more
To a rule that their fathers found proper before,
And the veriest scum of the gutters invents
Ideas obnoxious to dollars and cents.