When you're criticising others
And are finding here and there
A fault or two to speak of
Or a weakness you can tear;
When you're blaming some one's meanness
Or accusing some of pelf*--
It's time that you went out
To take a walk around yourself.

There's lots of human failures
In the average of us all,
And lots of grave shortcomings
In the short ones and the tall;
But when we think of evils
Men should lay upon the shelves,
It's time we all went out
To take a walk around ourselves.

We need so often in this life
This balancing of scales,
This seeing how much in us wins
And how much in us fails;
But before you judge another--
Just to lay him on the shelf--
It would be a splendid plan
To take a walk around yourself.

*Money, especially when gained in a dishonest or dishonorable way


From Poems That Inspire (Zondervan, 1960.
This poem is now in the public domain.