WIST

If fallacies come knocking at my door,
I’d rather feed, and shelter full a score,
Than hide behind the black portcullis, doubt,
And run the risk of barring one Truth out.

And if pretension for a time deceive,
And prove me one too ready to believe,
Far less my shame, than if by stubborn act,
I brand as lie, some great colossal Fact.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919) American author and poet.
“Credulity,” New Thought Pastels (1913)

The two kinds of people I mean
Are the people who lift and the people who lean.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919) American author and poet.
“Lifting and Leaning”

To sin by silence, when we should protest,
Makes cowards out of men.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919) American author and poet.
“Protest,” Poems of Problems (1914)
Mistakenly cited to Abraham Lincoln by Douglas MacArthur in a 1950 speech, and frequently since then.http://infomotions.com/etexts/gutenberg/dirs/etext04/ppur10.htm

So many gods, so many creeds;
So many paths that wind and wind,
While just the art of being kind
Is all the sad world needs.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919) American author and poet.
“The World’s Need”

So many gods, so many creeds;
So many paths that wind and wind,
While just the art of being kind
Is all the sad world needs.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919) American author and poet.
“The World’s Need” (1896)

All love that has not friendship for its base
Is like a mansion built upon the sand.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919) American author and poet.
“Upon the Sand” (1910)

All love that has not friendship for its base,
Is like a mansion built upon the sand.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919) American author and poet.
New Thought Pastels, “Love” (1913)

To sin by silence, when we should protest,
Makes cowards out of men.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850-1919) American author and poet.
Poems of Problems, “Protest” (1914)
Often misattributed to Abraham Lincoln.