Poetry Explorer- Classic Contemporary Poetry, THE TESTS OF PEACE, by WILLIAM ARTHUR DUNKERLEY


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Classic and Contemporary Poetry

THE TESTS OF PEACE, by                    
First Line: No less than war peace has its acid tests
Last Line: And the welfare of mankind!
Alternate Author Name(s): Oxenham, John
Subject(s): Peace; Religion; Theology


No less than War Peace has its acid tests.

War is most dreadful hell;
And yet full well
May Peace be fouler than War's foulest hell,
Unless some strong new soul of life
Rise up to stay, --
To stay if need be with the knife,
The slow, insidious dry-rot of decay,
Which no whit less than war doth Christ betray, --
-- Rise up to charge all life with quickened zest
For things not only better but the best.

Peace that means laxing of the soul's upreach, --
Peace that means but an ever-widening breach
'Twixt man and man, -- and so
'Twixt man and God, --
Peace that means tolerance of obvious wrong, --
Peace that means safety only for the strong, --
Peace that means heedlessness of others' woes, --
Peace that means chance new burdens to impose, --
Peace that means wealth outsweated from the poor, --
Peace that means Greed's perfidious coverture, --
Peace that means palaces on pigstyes reared, --
Peace that means gold with brave men's blood besmeared, --
Peace that means virtue offered out for hire, --
Peace that means honour trampled in the mire, --
Peace that means ill-division of life's good, --
Peace that means ill-adjustment of life's load, --
Peace that means brimming bowls and ruined lives, --
Peace that for sake of gain at shame connives, --
Peace that maintains the standards of the past, --
Peace that still leaves the Lord of All outcast, --
That is no peace! --
A mocking parody of peace, --
It shall not last.

Peace without God as base and cornerstone, --
Peace without Right concreted in its frame, --
Peace without Truth up-pillaring its dome, --
Peace without Justice buttressing its walls, --
Peace without Grace as its fair furnishing, --
Peace without Honour as its golden lamp, --
Peace that is all unfortified with Love, --
That is no peace, -- a straw house built on sand,
Which life's new needs can never meet
Nor time's rough circumstance withstand.
Get back to God and Fundamental Right!
Build His New House with patience infinite!
Resolve Life's vast complexities to ways
More simple, and exalt the days!
Let all Life's warp and woof be interwove
With gold of noble thought and radiant love,
So -- only so -- shall Life's New Temple stand,
Rock-firm, unshakable, His rightful deodand.

See to it then, Ye Builders of the Peace,
And build with bold emprise Life's new-won liberties!
Build His fair kingdom as He first designed
To His unending glory
And the welfare of mankind!





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