Why Should We Quarrel For Riches

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Title:     Why Should We Quarrel For Riches
Author: Anonymous (Poetry's author) [More Titles by Anonymous (Poetry's author)]

[A version of this very favourite song may be found in Ramsay's Tea-Table Miscellany. Though a sailor's song, we question whether it is not a greater favourite with landsmen. The chorus is become proverbial, and its philosophy has often been invoked to mitigate the evils and misfortunes of life.]

How pleasant a sailor's life passes,
Who roams o'er the watery main!
No treasure he ever amasses,
But cheerfully spends all his gain.
We're strangers to party and faction,
To honour and honesty true;
And would not commit a bad action
For power or profit in view.
Then why should we quarrel for riches,
Or any such glittering toys;
A light heart, and a thin pair of breeches,
Will go through the world, my brave boys!

The world is a beautiful garden,
Enriched with the blessings of life,
The toiler with plenty rewarding,
Which plenty too often breeds strife.
When terrible tempests assail us,
And mountainous billows affright,
No grandeur or wealth can avail us,
But skilful industry steers right.
Then why, &c.

The courtier's more subject to dangers,
Who rules at the helm of the state,
Than we that, to politics strangers,
Escape the snares laid for the great.
The various blessings of nature,
In various nations we try;
No mortals than us can be greater,
Who merrily live till we die.
Then why should, &c.

[The end]
Anonymous's poem: Why Should We Quarrel For Riches

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