A War Prayer, Mark Twain

[damYankee]

The story about Abe's letter from God made me think of this classic, which was not published until many years after Twain's death.
The War Prayer

by Mark Twain

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 spluttering; on every hand and far down the receding and fading spread 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 outpourings 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 young faces alight with martial dreams -- visions of the 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 heroes, 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 the day of battle and the hour of peril, bear 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 with 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 will 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 Him Who heareth all supplications, the spoken and the unspoken. Ponder this -- keep it in mind. If you would 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 of 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 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 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 the 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.

 

[JPK Huson 1863]

Wow. I hadn't read this one. He was just so prolific there always seems to be one more amazing nugget out there one hasn't seen before! It's typical Twain, isn't it, I mean apart from the way only he can glue words together- it'd be the point he was making. It's pointless I guess to wonder why it was not published when written- he may not have liked it himself, or his wife may have not liked it. Maybe his friendship with Grant, he thought it would be somehow slighting or misinterpreted as anti-Grant instead of anti-war. We'll never know, it's intriguing that it was not.

Thanks for posting this!

 

[lakertaker]

Twain - a true American treasure

 

[damYankee]

The War Prayer was written about the Spanish American War, his publisher rejected it at the time as to radical, upon Twains death his family chose not to release it as they feared it would appear sacrilegious, finally it was published ( I believe) for the first time in 1914.
There are volumes of his works that were not published until his children had passed away per his wishes.
The War Prayer was published with the authors primitive pencil drawings of the characters described. One of the drawings is a US Flag with skulls replacing the stars.
Clements had been in the Philippines after the Spanish American War, while US forces fought a bloody war to suppress the natives. And in China during the Boxer Rebellion, which he described as a act of genocide by the US.

 

[BillO]

That should be required reading before anyone is allowed to run for office or vote!

 

[donna]

Thanks for posting.

 

[JPK Huson 1863]

What a complicated man, you never stop learning about him. Reading his life in his words isn't really adequate- it's the biographies rather than the autobio I think I require. His autobiography seems to be this tip of the proverbial iceburg although iceburg is a terrible word to use as analogy for such a mecurial temperment.

Thanks very much for that, as always it's silly to conjecture on Twain. His feelings on war are so terribly clear, must have remained passionate on it for the rest of his life.

Having said that, I still think his short essay on his 2 weeks in the Confederate Army has some of the most hysterical 'stuff', and typically Twain, he's written.

 

[damYankee]

I think his essay on his two week career as a soldier is a must read. Imagine the impact he had all the young people reading his works at the time they were published! He captured the imagination of a generation.
I have letters sent to my grand mother from her father (he was born in 1870), in which he describes himself and his buddy running away from his childhood home in western Iowa, and building a raft to go down the Missouri River after reading Twain.
He writes that after 6 Long hours on that raft on a hot summer day, thinking they had sailed many hundred miles they beached their vessel and climb the river bank just to find out they had barely travel 10 miles!
They abandoned their might ship and walked home!

 

[JPK Huson 1863]

THAT is an awesome and amazing story, please excuse the 'awesome' part. In my opinion sometimes it does pay to have entirely too many teenagers around, fouling up one's slang. Awesome is apt- please excuse the commentary on your family, it's just quite a wonderful story. Gosh. It just sounds like something Twain himself would have done and then written about. WHAT an enchanting story to have in your family-although I suppose one would have to be a Twain addict to love it or 'get it'. My father loved Twain, river boats, ( for that matter canal boats, 'nother story ) would have laughed for 20 minutes and deeply understood small boys booking it for the nearest river after reading Twain.

That essay I think is what nudged me back into picking up Twain again after too many years. You forget how clear-sighted the man was. Yes, my goodness, with most of the English speaking world at his fingertips he could have swayed world opinion, I think, used his influence to rant and rave and just behave like a grandiose jerk. He never did- said what he thought and left it pretty much there. I don't suppose I'll ever get through all the reading by Twain I want to, at least great to have an author one never, ever becomes tired of.