The Prince George's enquirer and southern Maryland advertiser. (Upper Marlborough, Md.) 1882-1925, 1894-04-20
45oetrg.
A PRAYER FOR PEACE.

| [Tho following poem was written by the
late Mr.. S. Teackle Wallis in 1861, while i'm
prisoned during 'the Reign of Terror:''l
Peace. Peace, God of our fathers grant u:
Peace.
Unto our cry OF anguish and despair
Give ear and pity. From the lonely homes,
Where widowed beggary and orphaned woe
Fill their poor urns with tears; from trampled
plains,
Where the bright harvest Thou has sent us
The blood of them who should haze gar
nered it
Calling to Thee-from fields of carnage
where
The foul-5eakeG vutures, sated, flap their
wings
Ger crowded corpses, that but yesterday
Bore hearts of brothers, beating high will
And common hopes and pride, all blasted
Father of Mercies. not alone from these
Our prayer and wall are lifted. Not alone
Upon the battles scared and deso.ate track,
Nor with the sword and fame, is it, o God,
hearths,
And in the crowded streets and busy IN lrts,
Where echo whispers not the far-otf strife
That Stays our loved ones-in the solemn
halls
OF safe and quiet counsel-nay, beneath
The temple roofs that we have reared to Thee,
And mid their rising incense-God of Peace
The curse of war is on us. Greed and hate
Eungering for gold and blood: Ambition
bred
Of passionate vanity and sordid !usts,
Mad with the base desire of tyrannous sway
Over men's souls and thoughts have set their
price
On human hecatunbs, and sell and buy
Their sons and brothers for the shambles.
Priests,
With white, anoint ed, supplicating hands,
From Sabbath unto Sabbath clasped to Thee,
Burn, in their tiugling pulses, to fling down
Thy censers and thy cross, to clutch the
throats
OF kinsmen by whose cradles they were born,
Or grasp the brand of Herod, and go forth
Till X achel hath no children left to slay.
The very name of Jesus, writ upon
Thy shrines, beneath the spotless, out
str ched wings
OF Thine Almighty Dove, is wIapt and hid
With bloody battle flags, and from the spires
That rise above them, angry banners tlout
The skies to which they point, amid the clang
OF rolling warsongs turned to mock Thy
praise.
All things once priced aud honored are forgot.
The Freedom that we worshipped, next to
The manhood that was Freedoms spear and
shield;
The proud, true heart; the brave unspoken
word
Which might be stihed, but could never wear
The guise, whate'er the profit, of a lie
All these are gone, and in their stead, have
The vices of the mlser and the slave
Seeming no shame that brpgeth gu,l or
power,
Knowing no love, or faith, or reverence,
Or sympathy, or tie, or aim, or hope,
Save us begun in self, aud ending there.
With vipers like to these, o blessed God!
Scouraga us no louger Send us down, once
more,
Some shining seraph in Thy glory ell I'd,
To wake the midnight of our sorrowing
With tidings of Good Will and Peace to men;
And if the star that through the darkness led
Earth's wisdom then, guide not our folly
low,
oh, be the tightening Thine Evangelist,
With all its fiery, forked tongues to speak
The unanswerable message of Thy will.
Peace. Peace, God of our fathers, grant us
Peace in our hearts and at Thine altars;
On the red waters and their blighted shores;
Peace for thu leaguered cities, and the hosts
That watch and bleed, around them and
within.
Peace for the homeless and thefather less;
Peace for the captive on his weary way,
And the mad crowds who jeer his helpless
ness.
For them that suffer, them that do the
wrong;
Shining and sinned against-O God. for
all
For distracted, torn, and bleed ding land
Speed the glad tidings. Give us, give us
Peace