TO

MY SON HUGO

2nd LIEUT. ARGYLL AND SUTHERLAND HIGHLANDERS

TO

ALL HIS COMRADES IN ARMS ON LAND AND ON SEA

AND TO

ALL SORELY-TRIED HEARTS AT HOME AND ELSEWHERE

THIS VOLUME IS DEDICATED

IN PROFOUNDEST ADMIRATION, IN MOST LOVING SYMPATHY, AND IN PERFECT ASSURANCE THAT SINCE GOD IS, RIGHT MUST WIN AND THE FUTURE WILL BE BETTER THAN THE PAST

FOREWORD

For those who were chiefly in my heart when these verses came to me from time to time—our men and boys at the Front, and those they leave behind them in grievous sorrow and anxiety at home—my little message is that, so far as they are concerned—"ALL'S WELL!"

Those who have so nobly responded to the Call, and those who, with quiet faces and breaking hearts, have so bravely bidden them "God speed!"—with these, All is truly Well, for they are equally giving their best to what, in this case, we most of us devoutly believe to be the service of God and humanity.

War is red horror. But, better war than the utter crushing-out of liberty and civilisation under the heel of Prussian or any other militarism.

Germany has avowedly outmarched Christianity and left it in the rear, along with its outclassed guns and higher ideals of, say, 1870, its honour, its humanity, and all the other lumber, useless to an absolutely materialistic people whose only object is to win the world even at the price of its soul.

The world is witnessing with abhorrence the results, and, we may surely hope, learning therefrom The Final Lesson for its own future guidance.

The war-cloud still hangs over us—as I write, but, grim as it is, there are not lacking gleams of its silver linings. If war brings out the very worst in human nature it offers opportunity also for the display of the very best. And, thank God, proofs of this are not wanting among us, and it is better to let one's thought range the light rather than the darkness.

What the future holds for us no man may safely say. Mighty changes without a doubt. May they all be for the better! But if that is to be it must be the work of every one amongst us. In this, as in everything else, each one of us helps or hinders, makes or mars.

If, in some of these verses, I have endeavoured to strike a note of warning, it is because the times, and the times that are coming, call for it. May it be heeded!

That the end of the present world-strife must and will mark also the end of the most monstrous tyranny and the most hideous conception of "Kultur" the world has ever seen, no man for one moment doubts.

But that is not an end but a beginning. Unless on the ashes of the past we build to nobler purpose, all our gallant dead will have been thrown away, all this gigantic effort, with all its inevitable horror and loss, will have been in vain.

It rests with each one among us to say that that shall not be,—that the future shall repair the past,—that out of this holocaust of death shall come new life.

It behoves every one of us, each in his and her own sphere, and each in his and her own way, to strive with heart and soul for that mighty end.

JOHN OXENHAM.

PART ONE: "ALL'S WELL!"

GOD IS WATCHMAN! WHAT OF THE NIGHT? FOR THE MEN AT THE FRONT IN TIME OF NEED CHRISTS ALL! THE CROSS STILL STANDS! WHERE ARE YOU SLEEPING TO-NIGHT, MY LAD? BE QUIET! TO YOU WHO HAVE LOST LORD, SAVE THEIR SOULS ALIVE! THE ALABASTER BOX WHITE BROTHER A LITTLE TE DEUM FOR THESE TIMES THY WILL BE DONE! DIES IRAE—DIES PACIS JUDGMENT DAY THE HIGH THINGS THE EMPTY CHAIR ROAD-MATES ALPHA—OMEGA HAIL!—AND FAREWELL! A SILENT TE DEUM THE NAMELESS GRAVES BLINDED! SAID THE WOUNDED ONE:—— OUR SHARE POLICEMAN X.—EPILOGUE, 1914 THE MEETING-PLACE VICTORY DAY WHEN HE TRIES THE HEARTS OF MEN POISON-SEEDS THE WAR-MAKERS IS LIFE WORTH LIVING? GOD'S HANDWRITING

PART TWO: THE KING'S HIGH WAY

THE KING'S HIGH WAY THE WAYS AD FINEM EVENING BRINGS US HOME THE REAPER NO MAN GOETH ALONE. ROSEMARY EASTER SUNDAY, 1916 THE CHILD OF THE MAID WASTED? SHORTENED LIVES LAGGARD SPRING LONELY BROTHER COMFORT YE! S. ELIZABETH'S LEPER VOX CLAMANTIS FLORA'S BIT RED BREAST OUR HEARTS FOR YOU THE BURDENED ASS WINNERS OR LOSERS? CHRIST AT THE BAR MY BROTHER'S KEEPER? A TELEPHONE MESSAGE THE STARS' ACCUSAL NO PEACE BUT A RIGHT PEACE IN CHURCH. 1916. TE DEUM THROUGH ME ONLY PRINCE OF PEACE THE WINNOWING TO THIS END

ALL'S WELL!

PART ONE: "ALL'S WELL!"

GOD IS

God is; God sees; God loves; God knows. And Right is Right; And Right is Might. In the full ripeness of His Time, All these His vast prepotencies Shall round their grace-work to the prime Of full accomplishment, And we shall see the plan sublime Of His beneficent intent. Live on in hope! Press on in faith! Love conquers all things, Even Death.

WATCHMAN! WHAT OF THE NIGHT?

Watchman! What of the night? No light we see,— Our souls are bruised and sickened with the sight Of this foul crime against humanity. The Ways are dark—— "I SEE THE MORNING LIGHT!"

—The Ways are dark; Faith folds her wings; and Hope, in piteous plight, Has dimmed her radiant lamp to feeblest spark. Love bleeding lies—— "I SEE THE MORNING LIGHT!"

—Love bleeding lies, Struck down by this grim fury of despight, Which once again her Master crucifies. He dies again—— "I SEE THE MORNING LIGHT!"

—He dies again, By evil slain! Who died for man's respite By man's insensate rage again is slain. O woful sight!—— "I SEE THE MORNING LIGHT!

—Beyond the war-clouds and the reddened ways, I see the Promise of the Coming Days! I see His Sun arise, new-charged with grace Earth's tears to dry and all her woes efface! Christ lives! Christ loves! Christ rules! No more shall Might, Though leagued with all the Forces of the Night, Ride over Right. No more shall Wrong The world's gross agonies prolong. Who waits His Time shall surely see The triumph of His Constancy;— When, without let, or bar, or stay, The coming of His Perfect Day Shall sweep the Powers of Night away;— And Faith, replumed for nobler flight, And Hope, aglow with radiance bright, And Love, in loveliness bedight, SHALL GREET THE MORNING LIGHT!"

FOR THE MEN AT THE FRONT

Lord God of Hosts, whose mighty hand Dominion holds on sea and land, In Peace and War Thy Will we see Shaping the larger liberty. Nations may rise and nations fall, Thy Changeless Purpose rules them all.

When Death flies swift on wave or field, Be Thou a sure defence and shield! Console and succour those who fall, And help and hearten each and all! O, hear a people's prayers for those Who fearless face their country's foes!

For those who weak and broken lie, In weariness and agony— Great Healer, to their beds of pain Come, touch, and make them whole again! O, hear a people's prayers, and bless Thy servants in their hour of stress!

[Five million copies of this hymn have been sold and the profits given to the various Funds for the Wounded. It is now being sung all round the world.]

For those to whom the call shall come We pray Thy tender welcome home. The toil, the bitterness, all past, We trust them to Thy Love at last. O, hear a people's prayers for all Who, nobly striving, nobly fall!

To every stricken heart and home, O, come! In tenderest pity, come! To anxious souls who wait in fear, Be Thou most wonderfully near! And hear a people's prayers, for faith To quicken life and conquer death!

For those who minister and heal, And spend themselves, their skill, their zeal— Renew their hearts with Christ-like faith, And guard them from disease and death. And in Thine own good time, Lord, send Thy Peace on earth till Time shall end!

IN TIME OF NEED

Better than I, Thou knowest, Lord, All my necessity, And with a word Thou canst it all supply. Help other is there none Save Thee alone; Without Thee I'm undone. And so, to Thee I cry,— O, be Thou nigh! For, better far than I, Thou knowest, Lord, All my necessity.

CHRIST'S ALL!

Our Boys Who Have Gone to the Front

("Be christs!"—was one of W. T. Stead's favourite sayings. Not "Be like Christ!"—but—"Be christs!" And he used the word no doubt in its original meaning,—anointed, ordained, chosen. As such we, whose boys have gone to the Front, think of them. For they have gone, most of them, from a simple, high sense of duty, and in many cases under direst feeling of personal repulsion against the whole ghastly business. They have sacrificed everything, knowing full well that many of them will never return to us.)

Ye are all christs in this your self-surrender,— True sons of God in seeking not your own. Yours now the hardships,—yours shall be the splendour Of the Great Triumph and THE KING'S "Well done!"

Yours these rough Calvaries of high endeavour,— Flame of the trench, and foam of wintry seas. Nor Pain, nor Death, nor aught that is can sever You from the Love that bears you on His knees.

Yes, you are christs, if less at times your seeming.— Christ walks the earth in many a simple guise. We know you christs, when, in your souls' redeeming, The Christ-light blazes in your steadfast eyes.

Here—or hereafter, you shall see it ended,— This mighty work to which your souls are set. If from beyond—then, with the vision splendid, You shall smile back and never know regret.

Or soon, or late, for each—the Life Immortal! And not for us to choose the How or When. Or late, or soon,—what matter?—since the Portal Leads but to glories passing mortal ken.

O Lads! Dear Lads! Our christs of God's anointing! Press on in hope! Your faith and courage prove! Pass—by these High Ways of the Lord's appointing! You cannot pass beyond our boundless love.

THE CROSS STILL STANDS!

()"In the evening I went for a walk to a village lately shelled by German heavy guns. Their effect was awful—ghastly. It was impossible to imagine the amount of damage done until one really saw it. The church was terrible too. The spire was sticking upside down in the ground a short distance from the door. The church itself was a mass of debris. Scarcely anything was left unhit. In the churchyard again the destruction was terrific—tombstones thrown all over the place. But the most noticeable thing of all was that the three Crucifixes—one inside and two outside—were untouched! How they can have avoided the shelling is quite beyond me. It was a wonderful sight though an awful one. There were holes in the churchyard about fifteen feet across."—From a letter from my boy at the Front._)

The churchyard stones all blasted into shreds, The dead re-slain within their lowly beds,— THE CROSS STILL STANDS!

His holy ground all cratered and crevassed, All flailed to fragments by the fiery blast,— THE CROSS STILL STANDS!

His church a blackened ruin, scarce one stone Left on another,—yet, untouched alone,— THE CROSS STILL STANDS!

His shrines o'erthrown, His altars desecrate, His priests the victims of a pagan hate,— THE CROSS STILL STANDS!

'Mid all the horrors of the reddened ways, The thund'rous nights, the dark and dreadful days,— THE CROSS STILL STANDS!

* * * * *

And, 'mid the chaos of the Deadlier Strife,— A Church at odds with its own self and life,— HIS CROSS STILL STANDS!

Faith folds her wings, and Hope at times grows dim; The world goes wandering away from Him;— HIS CROSS STILL STANDS!

Love, with the lifted hands and thorn-crowned head, Still conquers Death, though life itself be fled;— HIS CROSS STILL STANDS!

Yes,—Love triumphant stands, and stands for more, In our great need, than e'er it stood before! HIS CROSS STILL STANDS!