"This is what you shall do: Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to everyone that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence toward the people, take off your hat to nothing known or unknown, or to any man or number of men, go freely with powerful uneducated persons, and with the young, and with the mothers of families, read these leaves in the open air every season of every year of your life, re-examine all you have been told at school or church or in any book, dismiss whatever insults your own soul, and your very flesh shall be a great poem and have the richest fluency, not only in its words, but in the silent lines of its lips and face, and between the lashes of your eyes, and in every motion and joint of your body."
Source: "Leaves of Grass" 1855 Edition - from This You Shall Do at inward/outward
Whitman wrote these words in the original 1855 version of "Leaves of Grass" in the form of "this is what you shall do..." and in the 1891 version he uses the same (or quite similar words) to say, "I have loved the earth, sun, animals...".
It's inspiring to think he wrote these words in his thirties, and as he approached his death at age seventy three - he was reflecting back, to say he had done what he set out to do.
