Kick him when he’s down (Thomas Martin Towne)
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- (Posted 2023-12-13) CPDL #78189:
- Editor: David Anderson (submitted 2023-12-13). Score information: Letter, 12 pages, 578 kB Copyright: Personal
- Edition notes:
General Information
Title: Kick him when he’s down
Composer: Thomas Martin Towne
Lyricist:
Number of voices: 4vv Voicing: SATB
Genre: Secular, Partsong
Language: English
Instruments: A cappella
First published: 1869 Root & Cady
Description:
External websites:
Original text and translations
English text
When the sun of prosperity’s shining,
And a man’s growing richer each day,
When in ease and contentment reclining,
And a golden success crowns his way,
How friends will then flock round about him,
But if fortune should happen to frown
O how quickly he’ll get the cold shoulder
And be kicked just because he is down.
Let a man get position or riches,
Matters not if by intrigue or fraud,
See! the world nods approvingly at him,
And his acts it will loudly applaud,
What though he may be a great villain!
With the simple, the wise and the clown,
While he’s up, he’s a tip-top good fellow,
But they’ll kick him if ever he’s down.
What’s the use of our being so moral,
Either upright, or “honest and true;”
For unless a man has “lots of money”
The whole world’s bound to “put him right through.”
They’ll “go for him” certain and surely,
From the jockey to priest in his gown,
All will stand ever ready to “snub him,”
And to kick him because he is down.
When, oh! when will mankind be less selfish,
Will it ever in future be thus?
That we always will do to each other
As we’d wish them to do unto us.
And if in “adversity’s ocean,”
We are sinking and ready to drown,
Ever blest be the friend whose devotion
Loves to help a man up when he’s down.