Eternal verities

Roger Cohen, writing on the Opinion page of the NYT, cites a Kipling poem, "The Gods of the Copybook Headings" as apropos to our world today and particularly the political and economic situation. I love it when Kipling gets some proper respect, because he knew a thing or two. Part of the poem reads

We moved as the Spirit listed. They never altered their pace,
Being neither cloud nor wind-borne like the Gods of the Market Place,
But they always caught up with our progress, and presently word would come
That a tribe had been wiped off its icefield, or the lights had gone out in Rome.

Read the entire poem here
Cohen writes

How could it happen? That outraged question springs now to everyone’s lips. But from Dutch tulips to Californian dotcoms, great heists have happened and will again. No flight from reality is as sweet as the illusion that money grows on trees.

Read all the Cohen piece here. Kipling was no fool, and requirements of decency and honesty will assert themselves even in a scoundrel time.