A Prayer

God grant to us the strength of men,
The patience of the brave;
The wisdom to be silent, when
The days with doubt are grave. 
When dangers come, as come they must,
Throughout the trying hours
Let us continue still to trust
That triumph shall be ours.

    We have foresworn our days of ease
      To battle for the right,
    To venture over troubled seas
      Oppression’s wrongs to fight. 
    And we have pledged ourselves to grief,
      And bitter hurt and pain,
    Then must we cling to this belief: 
      We suffer not in vain.

    God grant to us the strength of men,
      God help us to be true
    Until that glorious morning when
      The world shall smile anew. 
    We shall be tested sore and tried,
      And flayed by many fears,
    Yet let us in this faith abide,
      That right shall rule the years.

         Sympathy

One came to the house with a pretty speech: 
“It’s all for the best,” said he,
And I know that he sought my heart to reach,
And I know that he grieved with me.

But I was too full of my sorrow then
To list to his words or care;
Though I’ve tried I cannot recall again
The comfort he gave me there.

    But another came, and his lips were dumb
      As he grasped me by the hand,
    And he stammered:  “Old man, I had to come,
      Oh, I hope you’ll understand.”

And ever since then I have felt his hand
Clasped tightly in my own,
And to-day his silence I understand—­
My sorrowing he had known.

         Hate

They say we must not hate, nor fight in hate. 
I’ve thought it over many a solemn hour,
And cannot mildly view the man or state
That has no thought, save only to be great;
I cannot love the creature drunk with power. 
I hate the hand that slaughters babes at sea,
I hate that will that orders wives to die. 
And there is something rises up in me
When brutes run wild in crime and lechery
That soft adjustments will not satisfy.

    Men seldom fight the things they do not hate;
      A vice grows strong on mildly tempered scorn;
    Rank thrives the weed the gardeners tolerate;
    You cannot stroke the snake that lies in wait,
      And change his nature with to-morrow’s morn. 
    If roses are to bloom, the weeds must go;
      Vice be dethroned if virtue is to reign;
    Honor and shame together cannot grow,
    Sin either conquers or we lay it low,
      Wrong must be hated if the truth remain.

    I hold that we must fight this war in hate—­
      In bitter hate of blood in fury spilled;
    Of children, bending over book and slate,
    Slaughtered to make a Prussian despot great;
      In hate of mothers pitilessly killed. 
    In hate of liars plotting