Anne Putnam Sanford

“ And now they're coming home to us with glory in their eyes.
⁠Oh, it's home again, and home again, America for me!
⁠Our hearts are turning home again and there we long to be,
⁠In our beautiful big country beyond the ocean bars,
⁠Where the air is full of sunlight and the flag is full of stars.
Our boys have seen the Old World as none have seen before.
They know the grisly horror of the German gods of war:
The noble faith of Britain and the hero-heart of France,
The soul of Belgium's fortitude and Italy's romance. ”

“ But come—the war—even its sorrows—are over!
This may be Armistice Night, but never that first hysterical, wild reaction, ignoring still-bleeding wounds—but another trying to imitate it to hide even our scars. The people of the solemn morning and the pensive noon have gone home and changed their clothes, their faces and their hearts. All the signs that are left of the trying day are a few scattered poppies—some of them lying face down in the roadways, crushed in the mud under many feet.
We will remember only the victory to-night. We must laugh again. We feel that we have earned it. ”

“ America is at peace because she entertains a real friendship for all the nations of the world. It is not, as some have mistakenly supposed, a peace based upon self-interest. It is a peace based upon some of the most generous sentiments that characterize the heart. Our peace is not based upon the mere convenience of our national life. For great issues which it is our honorable obligation to defend we would plunge into any trouble necessary in order to defend our honor and our integrity—the honor and integrity of our nation. ”

“ There may be infinite activity; there may be almost violent activity in the midst of peace. Peace dwells, after all, in the character and in the heart, and that is where peace is rooted in this blessed country of ours. It is rooted in the hearts of the people. The only place where tinder lies and the spark may kindle a flame is where still deeper things lie which they love, the principles and independence of their own life. Let no man drop fire there! Because peace is inconsistent with the loss of self-respect. More than that, peace is inconsistent with the abandonment of principle. ”

“ Each day this thought of Peace becomes more real and blessed. I can lie on this green hill and praise Creation that I am alive in a world of beauty. I can go to sleep up here with the cover-let of sunlight warm on my body, and not wake to that old dull misery. I can even dream with a light heart, for my fair dreams will not be spoiled by waking, and my bad dreams will be cured the moment I open my eyes. I can look up at that blue sky without seeing trailed across it a mirage of the long horror, a film picture of all the things that have been done by men to men. ”

“ Crowded behind the gun-carriage in one long vista was an immense column of men of all branches of the navy and army moving up slowly before coming to a halt, and behind again other men in civilian clothes and everywhere among them and above them flowers in the form of wreaths and crosses.
Then all was still, and the picture was complete, framing in that coffin where the steel hat and the King's sword lay upon the flag which draped it. The soul of the nation at its best, purified at this moment by this emotion, was there in silence about the dust of that unknown. ”

“ May we take a lesson from their self-sacrificing heroism and may we help to make this great land of ours a free and happy home for those who are yet to come. May we all so live that those who have gone will not have died in vain and those who are with us will not have lived in vain and that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom and that government of the people, by the people, and for the people, shall not perish from the earth. ”

“ MESSAGE OF MARSHAL FERDINAND FOCH TO THE AMERICAN LEGION, NOVEMBER 11, 1921
It is out of sacrifice and suffering that the greatest things in life grow.
No man ever gave up part of himself in a great cause but that his sacrifice was rewarded a hundredfold in moral and spiritual blessings.
Our hearts pour out in sympathy to-day to the mothers, wives, fathers, sisters, brothers, of those brave soldiers who made the supreme sacrifice in the World War. Our prayers go up in unison for those men and at the same time we worship their memory. ”

“ America is in the fight because she "can do no other." Our men could not endure to wait an hour longer. "Watchman, what of the night?" was the interrogation that ran from armed camp to armed camp. Their brothers beneath the Union Jack and the Tricolor were in the thick of the hardest battle ever waged on earth, and were falling and dying. With a righteous indignation burning in their hearts, and on their lips the song of the happy warrior who vindicates the right, our men march forward into battle—their faces to the enemy—their love with us at home—their glory safe with God. ”

“ Not a chain is welded, not a wheel turns, not a building rises, save all men work together for the common end! War vaunts that he brings us love of country! (Here Peace steps forward, raises voice, and speaks with greater enthusiasm.) Do we love that which we destroy? Of what value is a land whose men are falling on distant battlefields, in suffering unspeakable, alone and unattended (War falls to his knees and hides face in hands, his spear clanging down by his side, and so remains until Liberty speaks. First Herald stands beside him protectingly, his hand on War's shoulder. Peace continues) ”

“ We beseech Thee, Lord of Compassion, shelter them forevermore under the cover of Thy wings, and let their souls be bound up in the bond of eternal life, with the souls of righteousness who are ever with Thee.
And the work of righteousness shall be peace, and the effect of righteousness, quietness and confidence forever. Nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. ”

“ What is this long silence, all this crowd in London streets two years after the armistice peace? Yes, those were old dreams that have passed, old ghosts passing down Whitehall among the living.
The silence ended. Some word rang out, bugles were blowing, they were sounding the "Last Post" to the unknown warrior of the Great War in which many men died without record or renown. Farther than Whitehall sounded the "Last Post" to the dead. Did the whole army of the dead hear that call to them from the living? ”

“ It is not an army that we must shape and train for war: it is a nation.
To this end our people must draw close in one compact front against a common foe. But this cannot be if each man pursues a private purpose. All must pursue one purpose. The Nation needs all men; but it needs each man, not in the field that will most pleasure him, but in the endeavor that will best serve the common good. ”

“ To-day these and similar tasks claim the greater part of their untiring devotion.
The soil of France is red with the blood of hundreds of American lads who gave their lives that this understanding of one another might be attained. It is in their tender memory that their resting places have been marked by remaining comrades. Hundreds were maimed and broken there, and are to-day unfit to wage life's battle in the face of the odds laid against them by the grim bookkeeper of war. Comrades sound in body and mind took up their fight. Love of the mother country ebbed as the rigors of war passed. ”

“ Foch arose, and emphasizing each one of his words, as if to be sure of summing up the interview thoroughly, he said:
"To command is nothing. To negotiate is nothing. What is necessary is to understand those with whom one has to deal and to make one's self thoroughly understood by them. To understand each other well is the whole secret of life!"
And Foch evidently meant also that it was the secret of the life of nations the same as that of individuals, the secret of peace and of war, the secret of commerce and of friendship. ”

“ Lest we forget the courage, patience and patriotic self-sacrifice of those who fought at Château-Thierry, in the Argonne and the supreme sacrifice of those who lie in Flanders fields. We thank Thee for the splendid lessons of heroism that we have learned from those who died that this world might be free. They gave the last full measure of devotion. We cherish their memories in our hearts and opposite the name of each we place the gold star of service. ”

“ But the right is more precious than peace, and we shall fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our hearts—for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own Governments, for the rights and liberties of small nations for a universal dominion of right by such a concert of free people as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free. ”

“ A new power and victory—aye, a victory that is God's is in sight. We Americans have never been oblivious to the fact that the people of this country have been standing for the same principles which we love and for which we live. England, thank God, is the mother of democracy, and England's children come back to-day to pour all their experience, the experience of a century and a half of independent life, with gratitude at the feet of their mother. ”

“ As they passed from moorings to the man-of-war anchorage on their way to the sea, their feeling that they had done with life and were going out to something new welled up in those battalions; they cheered and cheered till the harbor rang with cheering. As each ship crammed with soldiers drew near the battleships, the men swung their caps and cheered again, and the sailors answered, and the noise of cheering swelled, and the men in the ships not yet moving joined in, and the men ashore, till all the life in the harbor was giving thanks that it could go to death rejoicing. ”

“ Is this a country? No, it is a desert, more dreadful far than any wild and sandy waste of the Sahara! Shame on thee, War (turning to the kneeling figure) , that thou canst speak one word in thy defense, when thou destroyest sacred human life! (First Herald drops head.)
Liberty (motioning to Peace) . Enough, my daughter! Thou hast abased thine adversary, but we may not forget that he is ofttimes needed to preserve thee in thy sweet content. Look up, Sir Warrior (War lifts head, but does not rise from knees) , and know that thou servest not, save that thy cause be just. (Turning to audience.) ”

“ There is one armor that the world of men and women, as a world, has never yet put on. The churches have long bungled with its fastenings, but the world has gone unfended, and few have been those in whose hands the mystical sword of the spirit has shone with daily use.
This armor, waiting to be worn, is the armor of brotherhood and sacrifice, the sword of unselfishness, a conquering sword, with the power, when used, to unite the world in love. ”

“ It is a new manner of accepting and vitalizing our duty to give ourselves with thoughtful devotion to the common purpose of us all. It is in no sense a conscription of the unwilling; it is, rather, selection from a nation which has volunteered in mass. It is no more a choosing of those who shall march with the colors than it is a selection of those who shall serve an equally necessary and devoted purpose in the industries that lie behind the battle line. ”

“ The moon stood guard over the silent grave. In the East the first rays of the morning crept into the sky. They reached out vaguely, hesitatingly, touching the city of Washington where men were to gather that day to speak of peace—touching an inscription which the nation had cut in the stone above the body of its unknown soldier.
A solemn inscription; a nation's promise that he who lies there dead shall not have died in vain. ”

“ The beauty of day and night, the lark's song, the sweet-scented growing things, the rapture of health, and of pure air, the majesty of the stars, and the gladness of sunlight, of song and dance and simple friendliness, have never been enough for men. We crave our turbulent fate. Can wars, then, ever cease? Look in men's faces, read their writings, and beneath masks and hypocrisies note the restless creeping of the tiger spirit! There has never been anything to prevent the millennium except the nature of the human being. There are not enough lovers of beauty among men. ”

“ It will be all the easier for us to conduct ourselves as belligerents in a high spirit of right and fairness because we act without animus, not in enmity toward a people or with the desire to bring any injury or disadvantage upon them, but only in armed opposition to an irresponsible government which has thrown aside all considerations of humanity and of right and is running amuck.
We have no quarrel with the German people. We have no feeling toward them but one of sympathy and friendship. It was not upon their impulse that their government acted in entering the war. ”

“ We kill no more nor are killed.
"Peace. Bring flowers and strew them.
"Peace, Let the pent-up tears of the horrible years flow in gladness.
"Peace. Let the feet that were heavy with sadness dance in joy to the bells and the bugles.
"Peace. The boys will be coming. Lay down the needles and the mud-colored wool and the rolls of white bandages. Hurry. Hang out the flags and the banners.
"Peace. They'll be hungry and war-worn and weary. Beat up the cakes and pile in the raisins and citron. Polish once more, for the hundredth time, the chairs and the tables. Home must be shining its welcome. ”

“ America performed her service well. Her sons and daughters gave their services, their lives, their all, upon the altar of Democracy. The greatest service that we, the living, can give is far too small for so great a sacrifice. Gladly, eagerly, and willingly should we do all within our power to consecrate and commemorate those who so freely gave their last measure of devotion that the world might be safe for humanity and that Democracy might live.
Years have passed since that glorious and eventful November 11, 1918, when the armistice was signed which ended the greatest conflict in history. ”

“ In the crowd below me women were weeping quietly. It was the cry from their hearts that was heard farthest, perhaps. The men's faces were hard, like masks, hiding all they thought and felt.
The King stepped forward again and took a wreath from Lord Haig and laid it at the base of the cenotaph. It was the first of a world of flowers, brought as the tribute of loving hearts to this altar of the dead. Admirals and generals and statesmen came with wreaths and battalions of police followed, bearing great trophies of flowers on behalf of the fighting men and all their comrades. ”

“ The arbitrary power of the military caste of Germany which once could secretly and of its own single choice disturb the peace of the world is discredited and destroyed. And more than that—much more than that—has been accomplished. The great nations which associated themselves to destroy it have now definitely united in the common purpose to set up such a peace as will satisfy the longing of the whole world for disinterested justice, embodied in settlements which are based upon something much better and more lasting than the selfish competitive interests of powerful states. ”