WAR.

O war, thou son of hell, Whom angry heavens do make their minister! Shakspere.

O, shame to men, devil with devil damned Firm concord holds, men only disagree Of creatures rational, though under hope Of heavenly grace, and God proclaiming peace, Yet live in hatred, enmity, and strife Among themselves, and levy cruel wars, Wasting the earth, each other to destroy; As if, (which might induce us to accord,) Man had not hellish foes enough besides, That day and night for his destruction wait. Milton.

Rash, fruitless war, from wanton glory wag’d Is only splendid murder. Thomson.

O war!—what, what art thou? At once the proof and scourge of man’s fall’n state? After the brightest conquest, what appears Of all thy glories? for the vanquish’d chains! For the proud victors, what? alas! to reign O’er desolated nations! Hannah More.

War, horrid war! oh! would ye understand That direful word—that scourge of every land, Oh! then peruse the well-known leaves that time Himself hath traced in characters sublime: Consult the archives of many a vast domain Where pomp, and power, and crime once held their reign, And view with retrospective eye Th’ Imperial States whose awful destiny It was to fade, decay, and disappear, With scarce a trace to say “We once were here!” Yet wars and battles mark’d their passing day With strife tumultuous, and wild affray. Count Frederick Von Erlach.

The Son of God goes forth to war, A kingly crown to gain; His blood red banner streams afar,— Who follows in his train? Who best can drink his cup of woe, Triumphant over pain; Who patient bears his cross below, He follows in his train. The martyr first, whose eagle eye Could pierce beyond the grave; Who saw his Master in the sky, And called on Him to save. Like him, with pardon on his tongue, In midst of mortal pain, He prayed for them who did the wrong,— Who follows in his train? A glorious band, the chosen few On whom the Spirit came! Twelve valiant saints, their hopes they knew, And mocked the cross and flame. They met the tyrant’s brandished steel, The lion’s gory mane; They bow’d their necks the death to feel,— Who follows in their train? A noble army—men and boys, The matron and the maid, Around their Saviour’s throne rejoice, In robes of light array’d, They climbed the steep ascent of Heaven, Through peril, toil, and pain; O God, to us may grace be given, To follow in their train! Bishop Heber.

Secure from actual warfare, we have loved To swell the war-whoop, passionate for war! Alas! for ages ignorant of all Its ghastlier workings, famine, or blue plague, Battle or siege, or flight through wintry snows! We, this whole people, have been clamorous For war and bloodshed; animating sports, The which we pay for as a thing to talk of; Spectators and not combatants! No guess Anticipative of a wrong unfelt, No speculation or contingency, However dim and vague, too vague and dim To yield a justifying cause; and forth, Stuffed out with big preamble, holy names And adjurations of the God in heaven, We send our mandates for the certain death Of thousands and ten thousands! Boys and girls, And women that would groan to see a child Pull off an insect’s leg, all read of war, The best amusement for our morning’s meal! The poor wretch who has learnt his only prayer From curses, who knows scarcely words enough To ask a blessing from his heavenly Father, Becomes a fluent phraseman, absolute And technical in victories and defeats, And all our dainty terms for fratricide; Terms which we trundle smoothly o’er our tongues Like mere abstractions, empty sounds, to which We join no feeling, and attach no form! As if the soldier died without a wound; As if the fibres of this godlike frame Were gored without a pang; as if the wretch Who fell in battle, doing bloody deeds, Passed off to heaven, translated, and not killed; As though he had no wife to pine for him, No God to judge him. Coleridge.

Of all the murderous trades by mortals plied, ’Tis war alone that never violates The hallowed day by simulate respect— By hypocritic rest; no, no, the work proceeds, From sacred pinnacles are hung the flags That give the sign to slip the leash for slaughter, The bells whose knoll a holy calmness poured Into the good man’s breast, whose sound consoled The sick, the poor, the old—perversion dire! Pealing with sulphurous tongue, speak death-fraught words. From morn to eve destruction revels frenzied, Till at the hour when peaceful vesper chimes Were wont to sooth the ear, the trumpet sounds Pursuit, and flight altern; and for the song Of larks descending to their grass-bowered homes, The croak of flesh-gorged ravens, as they slake Their thirst in hoof-prints filled with gore, disturbs The stupor of the dying man; while death Triumphantly sails down the ensanguined stream, On corses, throned and crowned with shivered boughs, That erst hung imaged in the crystal tide. Grahame.

When war the demon lifts his banner high And loud artillery rends the affrighted sky; Swords clash with swords, on horses horses rush, Man tramples man, and nations nations crush, Death his vast scythe with sweep enormous wields; And shuddering pity quits the ensanguined fields. Dr. Darwin.

How like a fiend may man be made, Plying the foul and monstrous trade Whose harvest-field is human life, Whose sickle is the reeking sword! Quenching, with reckless hands in blood, Sparks kindled by the breath of God. J. G. Whittier.

Such is war! O heavens! when will the spiritual Sun arise, And with His beams effulgent, drive away The mists of error that so long have hung Their dark, unnatural drapery o’er the mind, That broods o’er human carnage! when will man Turn from the path of Cain, and learn to see A brother without hating? Rufus Dawes.