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Anti-war essays, poems, short stories and literary excerpts
British writers on peace and war
Edward Young: Selections on peace and war
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Edward Young
From Resignation
Nor…be surpris’d to hear
That laurels may be due
Not more to heroes of the field,
(Proud boasters!) than to you…
Beneath a banner nobler far
Than ever was unfurl’d
In fields of blood; a banner bright!
High wav’d o’er all the world.
It, like a streaming meteor, casts
A universal light…
The billows stain’d by slaughter’d foes
Inferior praise afford;
Reason’s a bloodless conqueror,
More glorious than the sword.
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From The Last Day
A life well spent, not the victorious sword,
Awards the crown, and styles the greater lord.
Nor monuments alone, and burial-earth,
Labours with man to this his second birth;
But where gay palaces in pomp arise,
And gilded theatres invade the skies,
Nations shall wake, whose unrespected bones
Support the pride of their luxurious sons.
The most magnificent and costly dome
Is but an upper chamber to the tomb.
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