From Virtue, Not from Crime, Does Wealth Arise
From virtue, not from crime, does wealth arise;
Crime but the mechanism that depletes--
Therefore seek virtue, most highly to prize.
Great bounty has been squandered, paradise
Looted by mere barbarians of its sweets.
From virtue, not from crime, does wealth arise--
Bewildered, so a soul may ask the skies,
“Whither flew wealth?” yet must, though he entreats,
Therefore seek virtue, most highly to prize.
From sin came poverty, yet man decries
The heavens as his curses he repeats.
From virtue, not from crime, does wealth arise,
And until such time as man realize,
Harsh earned will be the food which his mouth eats--
Therefore seek virtue, most highly to prize,
Ye children of the future, otherwise
Emulate these, whom vice led to defeats.
From virtue, not from crime, does wealth arise;
Therefore seek virtue, most highly to prize.