Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide,
In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side.

These lines come from James Russell Lowell’s abolitionist poem “The Present Crisis,” written in response to the national turmoil surrounding slavery and the Mexican–American War’s expansion of U.S. territory (and thus the question of whether slavery would spread). Lowell, a prominent New England poet and reform-minded intellectual, published the poem in 1844 as the United States faced mounting sectional conflict and moral debate. The poem urges readers to recognize that political moments can become moral tests, demanding a clear choice rather than neutrality. It was later frequently quoted in reform and political rhetoric as a call to conscience in times of national decision.

Lowell frames history as punctuated by decisive “moments” when individuals and nations must choose between opposing moral forces—“Truth” and “Falsehood,” “good” and “evil.” The couplet rejects the comfort of delay or neutrality: crisis compresses time, making evasion itself a choice. By pairing “every man” with “nation,” Lowell links private conscience to public policy, implying that civic life is an arena of ethical responsibility. The elevated, almost prophetic diction casts reform as a moral imperative rather than a partisan preference, which helps explain why the lines have endured as a general summons to principled action well beyond their original anti-slavery context.

1) “Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide,” (often quoted alone)
2) “In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side.” (sometimes quoted as the second line by itself)
3) “Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide / In the strife of truth with falsehood, for the good or evil side.” (commonly lowercased “truth/falsehood” in reprints)