Oops, A Senior Moment-As The War Clouds Loom -Mark Twain’s
“The War Prayer” (1904)
By Si Lannon
Those of us of a certain generation, let’s call it like
Frank Jackman, another writer in this stable likes to call us, the “Generation
of ’68,” reflecting the turmoil and turbulence of our youth, and, no, not 1868
will occasionally have what I will euphemistically call a lapse but which is
more generally named a senior moment. Such an event occurred recently to my
good friend known since the high school battle days in the 1960s hence also a ‘68er,
Sam Lowell.
Sam, a Vietnam veteran whose experience turned him against
war after what he saw, and did, in Vietnam, has one way or another been
involved with some combination of veterans to try to bring the message of peace to a sometimes
deaf or indifferent world. For the past several years he had been an ardent member
of a national veterans group, Veterans for Peace, if you live in big cities, or
near them you might have seen their fluttering black dove emblem on white
background flags in some peace parade. The organization, like most organizations,
has periodic business meeting to discuss what has happened in the past period
and what plans should be laid going forward.
Fair enough. However at the last monthly meeting the Recording
Secretary was absent (an excused absence since he was ill) and the chairperson requested
somebody to fill in and do the minutes. Since virtually nobody except a person
with a great memory would want the job on a long term basis, or short, everybody
in the meeting room quickly put their guilty heads down. Unfortunately Sam didn’t
get his down fast enough and he was dragooned, his word, by the crafty chair since
his head was up. So he did the notes as direction which he intended to clean up
the next day and ask for any corrections, etc. on the group’s website. No
problem there either as he got some helpful corrections and then put out a
final set of minutes on the website.
Alright that sets the stage. Now, according to Sam, one of
the nice parts of the meeting agenda is near the beginning in what are called “opening
words, where somebody volunteers to say a few words, read a passage, recite a
poem to put things in perspective. So a fellow member, noting the gathering war
clouds over issues like North Korea and Iran by the administration in
Washington, thoughtfully presented Mark Twain’s The War Prayer from 1904. A very powerful and thought-provoking
little piece of work. Initially Sam, realizing that the website would have many
more people on it than generally attend meetings attached the piece to the end
of the minutes. And that is where the senior moment comes in.
Let Sam take it from here as he sent out a separate e-mail
based on his “error”:
“Here is the basis of my senior moment and see if you agree.
Yesterday December 15th I sent out the minutes from Monday’s General
Meeting (which I was dragooned into producing but that did not have anything to
do with the senior moment). At the end, the very end of those minutes I placed
a copy of Mark Twain’s The War Prayer
(1904) which our brother Dan Henry had present during the Opening Words section
of the meeting.
“The senior moment? Well who the hell, including me, reads
the freaking minutes much less go the bottom of the endless thing to find a gem
of a poem. To rectify things I have placed Mr. Twain’s excellent take on the
war clouds looming in his day here where hopefully it will be read. Thanks Dan
Henry for your presentation. Later Sam Lowell Johnson.”
And here it is:
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The War Prayer
by Mark Twain 1904 |
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It was a time of great and exalting excitement. The
country was up in arms, the war was on, in every breast burned the holy fire
of patriotism; the drums were beating, the bands playing, the toy pistols
popping, the bunched firecrackers hissing and sputtering; on every hand and
far down the receding and fading spreads of roofs and balconies a fluttering
wilderness of flags flashed in the sun; daily the young volunteers marched
down the wide avenue gay and fine in their new uniforms, the proud fathers
and mothers and sisters and sweethearts cheering them with voices choked with
happy emotion as they swung by; nightly the packed mass meetings listened,
panting, to patriot oratory which stirred the deepest deeps of their hearts
and which they interrupted at briefest intervals with cyclones of applause,
the tears running down their cheeks the while; in the churches the pastors
preached devotion to flag and country and invoked the God of Battles,
beseeching His aid in our good cause in outpouring of fervid eloquence which
moved every listener.
It was indeed a glad and gracious time, and the half dozen rash
spirits that ventured to disapprove of the war and cast a doubt upon its
righteousness straightway got such a stern and angry warning that for their
personal safety's sake they quickly shrank out of sight and offended no more
in that way.
Sunday morning came – next day the battalions would leave for
the front; the church was filled; the volunteers were there, their faces
alight with material dreams-visions of a stern advance, the gathering
momentum, the rushing charge, the flashing sabers, the flight of the foe, the
tumult, the enveloping smoke, the fierce pursuit, the surrender! – then home
from the war, bronzed heros, welcomed, adored, submerged in golden seas of glory!
With the volunteers sat their dear ones, proud, happy, and envied by the
neighbors and friends who had no sons and brothers to send forth to the field
of honor, there to win for the flag or, failing, die the noblest of noble
deaths. The service proceeded; a war chapter from the Old Testament was read;
the first prayer was said; it was followed by an organ burst that shook the
building, and with one impulse the house rose, with glowing eyes and beating
hearts, and poured out that tremendous invocation – "God the
all-terrible! Thou who ordainest, Thunder thy clarion and lightning thy
sword!"
Then came the "long" prayer. None could remember the
like of it for passionate pleading and moving and beautiful language. The
burden of its supplication was that an ever – merciful and benignant Father
of us all would watch over our noble young soldiers and aid, comfort, and
encourage them in their patriotic work; bless them, shield them in His mighty
hand, make them strong and confident, invincible in the bloody onset; help
them to crush the foe, grant to them and to their flag and country
imperishable honor and glory.
An aged stranger entered and moved with slow and noiseless step
up the main aisle, his eyes fixed upon the minister, his long body clothed in
a robe that reached to his feet, his head bare, his white hair descending in
a frothy cataract to his shoulders, his seamy face unnaturally pale, pale
even to ghastliness. With all eyes following him and wondering, he made his
silent way; without pausing, he ascended to the preacher's side and stood
there, waiting.
With shut lids the preacher, unconscious of his presence,
continued his moving prayer, and at last finished it with the words, uttered
in fervent appeal,"Bless our arms, grant us the victory, O Lord our God,
Father and Protector of our land and flag!"
The stranger touched his arm, motioned him to step aside – which
the startled minister did – and took his place. During some moments he
surveyed the spellbound audience with solemn eyes in which burned an uncanny
light; then in a deep voice he said
"I come from the Throne – bearing a message from Almighty
God!" The words smote the house with a shock; if the stranger perceived
it he gave no attention. "He has heard the prayer of His servant your
shepherd and grant it if such shall be your desire after I, His messenger,
shall have explained to you its import – that is to say, its full import. For
it is like unto many of the prayers of men, in that it asks for more than he
who utters it is aware of – except he pause and think.
"God's servant and yours has prayed his prayer. Has he
paused and taken thought? Is it one prayer? No, it is two – one uttered, the
other not. Both have reached the ear of His Who hearth all supplications, the
spoken and the unspoken. Ponder this – keep it in mind. If you beseech a
blessing upon yourself, beware! lest without intent you invoke a curse upon a
neighbor at the same time. If you pray for the blessing of rain upon your
crop which needs it, by that act you are possibly praying for a curse upon
some neighbor's crop which may not need rain and can be injured by it.
"You have heard your servant's prayer – the uttered part of
it. I am commissioned by God to put into words the other part of it – that
part which the pastor, and also you in your hearts, fervently prayed
silently. And ignorantly and unthinkingly? God grant that it was so! You
heard these words: 'Grant us the victory, O Lord our God!' That is
sufficient. The whole of the uttered prayer is compact into those pregnant
words. Elaborations were not necessary. When you have prayed for victory you
have prayed for many unmentioned results which follow victory – must follow
it, cannot help but follow it. Upon the listening spirit of God the Father
fell also the unspoken part of the prayer. He commandeth me to put it into
words. Listen!
"O Lord our Father, our young patriots, idols of our
hearts, go forth to battle – be Thou near them! With them, in spirit, we also
go forth from the sweet peace of our beloved firesides to smite the foe. O
Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our
shells; help us to cover their smiling fields with the pale forms of their
patriot dead; help us to drown the thunder of the guns with the shrieks of
their wounded, writhing in pain; help us to lay waste their humble homes with
a hurricane of fire; help us to wring the hearts of their unoffending widows
with unavailing grief; help us to turn them out roofless with their little
children to wander unfriended the wastes of their desolated land in rags and
hunger and thirst, sports of the sun flames of summer and the icy winds of
winter, broken in spirit, worn with travail, imploring Thee for the refuge of
the grave and denied it – for our sakes who adore Thee, Lord, blast their
hopes, blight their lives, protract their bitter pilgrimage, make heavy their
steps, water their way with their tears, stain the white snow with the blood
of their wounded feet! We ask it, in the spirit of love, of Him Who is the
Source of Love, and Who is ever-faithful refuge and friend of all that are sore beset
and seek His aid with humble and contrite hearts. Amen.
(After a pause)
“Ye have prayed it; if ye still desire it, speak! The messenger
of the Most High waits.”
It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because
there was no sense in what he said.
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