I sing the hymn of the conquered, who fell in the battle of life,
The hymn of the wounded and beaten, who died overwhelmed in the strife;
Not the jubilant song of the victors, for whom the resounding acclaim
Of nations was lifted in chorus, whose brows wore the chaplet of fame,
But the hymn of the low and the humble, the weary and broken in heart,
Who strove and who failed, acting bravely a silent and desperate part;
Whose youth bore no flower on its branches, whose hopes burned in ashes
away,
From whose hands slipped the prize they had grasped at, who stood at
the dying of day
With the wreck of their life all around them, unpitied, unheeded,
alone,
With death swooping down o'er their failure, and all but their faith
overthrown.
While the voice of the world shouts its chorus--its pean for those who
have won;
While the trumpet is sounding triumphant, and high to the breeze and
the sun
Glad banners are waving, hands clapping, and hurrying feet
Thronging after the laurel-crowned victors, I stand on the field of
defeat,
In the shadow, with those who are fallen, and wounded, and dying, and
there
Chant a requiem low, place my hand on their pain-knotted brows, breathe
a prayer,
Hold the hand that is helpless, and whisper, "They only the victory
win,
Who have fought the good fight and have vanquished the demon that
tempts us within;
Who have held to their faith unseduced by the prize that the world
holds on high;
Who have dared for a high cause to suffer, resist, fight--if need be,
to die."
Speak, History! who are Life's victors? Unroll thy long annals and say,
Are they those whom the world called the victors? who won the success
of a day?
The martyrs, or Nero? The Spartans who fell at Thermopylae's tryst,
Or the Persians and Xerxes? His judges, or Socrates? Pilate, or Christ?
--William M. Story.
He makes no friend who never made a foe.
--Alfred Tennyson.