in their
extremity seek support in the same spirit of patriotic devotion which
had upheld their heroes in the hour of death. As they had been lifted
above fear by the thought that it was for their country they were dying,
not less should those who mourned them find inspiration in remembering
it was for the nation's sake that their tears were shed, and for the
country that their hearts were broken. It had been appointed that half
in blood of men and half in women's tears the ransom of the people
should be paid, so that their sorrow was not in vain, but for the
healing of the nation.

It behooved these, therefore, to prove worthy of their high calling of
martyrdom, and while they must needs weep, not to weep as other women
wept, with hearts bowed down, but rather with uplifted faces, adopting
and ratifying, though it might be with breaking hearts, this exchange
they had made of earthly happiness for the life of their native land. So
should they honor those they mourned, and be joined with them not only
in sacrifice but in the spirit of sacrifice.

So it was in response to the appeal of this stricken girl before him
that the minister talked of the country, and to such purpose was it that
the piteous thing she had dreaded, the feeling, now when it was forever
too late, that it would have been better if she had kept her lover back,
found no place in her heart. There was, indeed, had she known it, no
danger at all that she would be left to endure that, so long as she
dreaded it, for the only prayer that never is unanswered is the prayer
to be lifted above self. So to pray and so to wish is but to cease to
resist the divine gravitations ever pulling at the soul. As the minister
discoursed of the mystic gain of self-sacrifice, the mystery of which
he spoke was fulfilled in her heart. She appeared to stand in some
place overarching life t and death, and there was made partaker of an
exultation whereof if religion and philosophy might but catch and hold
the secret, their ancient quest were over.

Grazing through streaming eyes upon the coffin of her lover, she was
able freely to consent to the sacrifice of her own life which he had
made in giving up his own.

End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of An Echo Of Antietam, by Edward Bellamy

*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK AN ECHO OF ANTIETAM ***

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