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<div style="background:#fff;border:#bbb dashed 1px;padding:5px"><a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=343022" style="color:#000;text-decoration:none"><div style="margin:10px 0"><strong>To E.S. Salomon</strong></div><div style="margin:10px 0">What! Salomon! such words from you,<br>Who call yourself a soldier? Well,<br>The Southern brother where he fell<br>Slept all your base oration through.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Alike to him-he cannot know<br>Your praise or blame: as little harm<br>Your tongue can do him as your arm<br>A quarter-century ago.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The brave respect the brave. The brave<br>Respect the dead; but _you_-you draw<br>That ancient blade, the ass's jaw,<br>And shake it o'er a hero's grave.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Are you not he who makes to-day<br>A merchandise of old renown<br>Which he persuades this easy town<br>He won in battle far away?</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Nay, those the fallen who revile<br>Have ne'er before the living stood<br>And stoutly made their battle good<br>And greeted danger with a smile.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">What if the dead whom still you hate<br>Were wrong? Are you so surely right?<br>We know the issue of the fight<br>The sword is but an advocate.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">Men live and die, and other men<br>Arise with knowledges diverse:<br>What seemed a blessing seems a curse,<br>And Now is still at odds with Then.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The years go on, the old comes back<br>To mock the new-beneath the sun.<br>Is _nothing_ new; ideas run<br>Recurrent in an endless track.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">What most we censure, men as wise<br>Have reverently practiced; nor<br>Will future wisdom fail to war<br>On principles we dearly prize.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">We do not know-we can but deem,<br>And he is loyalest and best<br>Who takes the light full on his breast<br>And follows it throughout the dream.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The broken light, the shadows wide<br>Behold the battle-field displayed!<br>God save the vanquished from the blade,<br>The victor from the victor's pride!</div><div style="margin:10px 0">If, Salomon, the blessed dew<br>That falls upon the Blue and Gray<br>Is powerless to wash away<br>The sin of differing from you.</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br>Remember how the flood of years<br>Has rolled across the erring slain;<br>Remember, too, the cleansing rain<br>Of widows' and of orphans' tears.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The dead are dead-let that atone:<br>And though with equal hand we strew<br>The blooms on saint and sinner too,<br>Yet God will know to choose his own.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">The wretch, whate'er his life and lot,<br>Who does not love the harmless dead<br>With all his heart and all his head-<br>May God forgive him-_I_ shall not.</div><div style="margin:10px 0">When, Salomon, you come to quaff<br>The Darker Cup with meeker face,<br>I, loving you at last, shall trace<br>Upon your tomb this epitaph:</div><div style="margin:10px 0">'Draw near, ye generous and brave<br>Kneel round this monument and weep:<br>It covers one who tried to keep<br>A flower from a dead man's grave.'</div><div style="margin:10px 0"><br /></a><br />poem by <a href="http://en.citatepedia.ro/by.php?a=Ambrose+Bierce">Ambrose Bierce</a><div class=q>
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<script type="text/javascript" src="//s7.addthis.com/js/300/addthis_widget.js#pubid=citatepedia" async="async"></script><div style="display:inline-block" class="addthis_sharing_toolbox" data-url="http://en.citatepedia.ro/comments.php?id=343022" data-title="To E.S. Salomon de Ambrose Bierce" data-description="What! Salomon! such words from you,
Who call yourself a soldier? Well,
The Southern brother where he fell
Slept all your base oration through.

Alike to him-he cannot know
Your praise or blame: as little harm
Your tongue can do him as your arm
A q..."></div>
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