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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 fiends 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.
MARK TWAIN
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