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.