---
title: Improvement Era
description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930.
authors:
  - W. S. Phillips
collections:
  - periodicals
tags:
  - magazine
  - improvement-era
periodical: Improvement Era
volume: 7
number: 9
published: 1904-07
publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations
publisher_place: Salt Lake City
language: en
type: magazine
reference: 'W. S. Phillips, "A Dream," *Improvement Era* 7, no. 9 (July 1904): 646.'
source:
  url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0709unse
  transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers.
  identifier: improvementera0709unse
start_page: 646
end_page: 646
rights:
  status: public-domain
  basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1904-07)
  source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0709unse
  publication_year: 1904
  note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1904, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright.
---

# A Dream

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He it was who defended it against a powerful foe.              It   is   he who
has sustained it up to the present.       Let us see to it that we offend
him not by a "ripened iniquity."

                               A DREAM.
                      (For the Improvement Era.)

               Idreamed I saw two fair young lives
                 Come from the throne of Grace;
               They took upon them mortal mould,
                 Eaeh fair of form and face.

               One winged its flight to stately halls;
                   One, to a lowly cot.
               One chose the joys and wealth of earth,
                   And one the pauper's lot.
               I   saw the two walk side by side.
                    Through childhood's flowery gate;
               I   saw the two emerge at last
                   To manhood's fair estate.

               And he who sought the stately halls
                   A life of pleasure led;
               But he who chose the lonely cot.
                   Toiled for his daily bread.

               Unfair, 1 thought, that one should have
                   All wealth and power by birth:
               Forgetting there are greater things,
                   Than powers and pelf of earth.

               The scene changed to a justice court:
                   The judge, the pauper mild;
               But he who stood to answer guilt,
                 Was fortune's pampered child.
               And then I saw that God was just,
                   That all his deeds are right;
               That oftentimes the brightest day,
                   Succeeds the darkest night.       W. S. Phillips.
  Weston, Idaho.