IF

If you can keep your head when all about you 

Are losing theirs & blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait & not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,

Or being hated, don't give way to hating,

And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise

If you can dream ― & not make dreams your master;

If you can think ― & not make thoughts your aim;

If you can meet with Triumph & Disaster

And treat those two impostors just the same;

If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken

Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,

Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,

And stoop & build 'em up with worn-out tools

If you can make one heap of all your winnings 

And risk it on one turn of pitch-&-toss,

And lose, & start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss;

If you can force your heart & nerve & sinew

To serve your turn long after they are gone,

And so hold on when there is nothing in you

Except the will which says to them: "Hold on!"

If you can talk with crowds & keep your virtue,

Or walk with Kings ― nor lose the common touch,

If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,

If all men count with you, but none too much;

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,

Yours is the Earth & everything that's in it,

And ― which is more ― you'll be a Man, my son!

― Rudyard Kipling

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