Moderation

What pious people label vice

I reckon mainly pleasure;

I deem the women, wine and dice

Are good in modest measure;

Though sanctity and truth receive

My hearty approbation,

Of all the virtues, I believe

The best is Moderation.

 Tombstone Autumn Shadows

Tombstone Territorial Park

Yukon, Canada

Photograph by Jack Bauer

Be moderate in love and hate,

Soft pedal on emotion;

And never let your passion get

The better of your caution.

Should Right or Leftist seek to goad

you from the course that's level,

Stick to the middle of the road

And send them to the devil.

Though rich the feast be moderate

In eating and in drinking;

An appetite insatiate

Is evil to my thinking.

Though ladies languidly await

Your kisses, on your way shun

Their wiles, but-well, be moderate

Even in moderation.

Avoid extremes: be moderate

In saving and in spending

An equable and easy gait

Will win an easy ending...

So here's to him of open mind,

Of sense and toleration,

That hope of headlong human-kind,

The Man of Moderation.

"Moderation"

Robert William Service

(1874-1958)

English-born Scottish-Canadian poet 

"The Bard of the Yukon"