If nobody smiled and nobody cheered and nobody
helped us along,
If each every minute looked after himself and
good things all went to the strong,
If nobody cared just a little for you, and nobody
thought about me,
And we stood all alone to the battle of life, what
a dreary old world it would be!
If there were no such a thing as a flag in the sky
as a symbol of comradeship here,
If we lived as the animals live in the woods, with
nothing held sacred or dear,
And selfishness ruled us from birth to the end,
and never a neighbor had we,
And never we gave to another in need, what a
dreary old world it would be!
Oh, if we were rich as the richest on earth and
strong as the strongest that lives,
Yet never we knew the delight and the charm of
the smile which the other man gives,
If kindness were never a part of ourselves,
though we owned all the land we could see,
And friendship meant nothing at all to us here,
what a dreary old world it would be!
Life is sweet just because of the friends we have
made and the things which in common we share;
We want to live on not because of ourselves, but
because of the people who care;
It's giving and doing for somebody else--on that
all life's splendor depends,
And the joy of this world, when you've summed
it all up, is found in the making of friends.