Some UK "world citizen" idiot left a nasty comment on the post "What it really means"
"Why do you Americans have to fall for this sentimentalist jingoistic bullshit" or some such words; I dont remember, I deleted him immediately (note, disagreement, debate, and discussion are allowed in my comments, assholes and insults are not).
There was a time when English Men, Europeans, and Canadians understood what it seems only Americans still do: Although war is never to be desired, nor is it ever the "right" thing to do, sometimes it is the least wrong thing to do, sometimes it is necessary.
Englishmen (and one Canadian) knew this so well in fact, they wrote some of the greatest words ever expressed in our language:
Memorial day is not only a U.S. holiday; it is a holiday for all the men (and women) who died fighting for what is right in this world.
In Flanders Fields
by Lt. Col. John McCrae, M.D. (1872-1918)
Canadian Army
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved, and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
It saddens me that there are now so few English Men left. How many in England would now understand these words:
"To Lucasta, going to the wars""Loved I not honour more"... I can imagine a few marines, royal or American saying that... but the run of the mill Englishman?
Richard Lovelace
TELL me not, Sweet, I am unkind,
That from the nunnery
Of thy chaste breast and quiet mind
To war and arms I fly.
True, a new mistress now I chase,
The first foe in the field;
And with a stronger faith embrace
A sword, a horse, a shield.
Yet this inconstancy is such
As thou too shalt adore;
I could not love thee, Dear, so much,
Loved I not Honour more.
Or this... a ballad to how the spirit, and valor of men can overcome ... the charge is one of the biggest military blunders of all time; an accident really, but it broke the crimean war wide open.
"Charge of the Light Brigade"Is the English Man so truly dead? Does the union jack no longer mean anything? This is coming from an Irish Man, (Irish father, American mother, part Irish raised part American), to whom the jack is a symbol of opression; but to you English is it no longer a symbol of pride? Is it just some piece of Kitschery to be worn on shirts and painted on mini-coopers, or draped around the shoulders of overpaid footballers? Have you forgotten Kipling entireley?
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
"Forward, the Light Brigade!
"Charge for the guns!" he said:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
"Forward, the Light Brigade!"
Was there a man dismay'd?
Not tho' the soldier knew
Someone had blunder'd:
Their's not to make reply,
Their's not to reason why,
Their's but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volley'd and thunder'd;
Storm'd at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well,
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.
Flash'd all their sabres bare,
Flash'd as they turn'd in air,
Sabring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while
All the world wonder'd:
Plunged in the battery-smoke
Right thro' the line they broke;
Cossack and Russian
Reel'd from the sabre stroke
Shatter'd and sunder'd.
Then they rode back, but not
Not the six hundred.
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them
Volley'd and thunder'd;
Storm'd at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell,
They that had fought so well
Came thro' the jaws of Death
Back from the mouth of Hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.
When can their glory fade?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honor the charge they made,
Honor the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred.
The English FlagFinally, what I think are the greatest words ever written about what it means to be a soldier; but what to the "modern european" English not-a-man, must seem to be nothing but jingositic sentimentalist claptrap:
Above the portico a flag-staff, bearing the Union Jack,
remained fluttering in the flames for some time, but ultimately
when it fell the crowds rent the air with shouts,
and seemed to see significance in the incident. -- DAILY PAPERS.
Winds of the World, give answer! They are whimpering to and fro --
And what should they know of England who only England know? --
The poor little street-bred people that vapour and fume and brag,
They are lifting their heads in the stillness to yelp at the English Flag!
Must we borrow a clout from the Boer -- to plaster anew with dirt?
An Irish liar's bandage, or an English coward's shirt?
We may not speak of England; her Flag's to sell or share.
What is the Flag of England? Winds of the World, declare!
The North Wind blew: -- "From Bergen my steel-shod vanguards go;
I chase your lazy whalers home from the Disko floe;
By the great North Lights above me I work the will of God,
And the liner splits on the ice-field or the Dogger fills with cod.
"I barred my gates with iron, I shuttered my doors with flame,
Because to force my ramparts your nutshell navies came;
I took the sun from their presence, I cut them down with my blast,
And they died, but the Flag of England blew free ere the spirit passed.
"The lean white bear hath seen it in the long, long Arctic night,
The musk-ox knows the standard that flouts the Northern Light:
What is the Flag of England? Ye have but my bergs to dare,
Ye have but my drifts to conquer. Go forth, for it is there!"
The South Wind sighed: -- "From the Virgins my mid-sea course was ta'en
Over a thousand islands lost in an idle main,
Where the sea-egg flames on the coral and the long-backed breakers croon
Their endless ocean legends to the lazy, locked lagoon.
"Strayed amid lonely islets, mazed amid outer keys,
I waked the palms to laughter -- I tossed the scud in the breeze --
Never was isle so little, never was sea so lone,
But over the scud and the palm-trees an English flag was flown.
"I have wrenched it free from the halliard to hang for a wisp on the Horn;
I have chased it north to the Lizard -- ribboned and rolled and torn;
I have spread its fold o'er the dying, adrift in a hopeless sea;
I have hurled it swift on the slaver, and seen the slave set free.
"My basking sunfish know it, and wheeling albatross,
Where the lone wave fills with fire beneath the Southern Cross.
What is the Flag of England? Ye have but my reefs to dare,
Ye have but my seas to furrow. Go forth, for it is there!"
The East Wind roared: -- "From the Kuriles, the Bitter Seas, I come,
And me men call the Home-Wind, for I bring the English home.
Look -- look well to your shipping! By the breath of my mad typhoon
I swept your close-packed Praya and beached your best at Kowloon!
"The reeling junks behind me and the racing seas before,
I raped your richest roadstead -- I plundered Singapore!
I set my hand on the Hoogli; as a hooded snake she rose,
And I flung your stoutest steamers to roost with the startled crows.
"Never the lotus closes, never the wild-fowl wake,
But a soul goes out on the East Wind that died for England's sake --
Man or woman or suckling, mother or bride or maid --
Because on the bones of the English the English Flag is stayed.
"The desert-dust hath dimmed it, the flying wild-ass knows,
The scared white leopard winds it across the taintless snows.
What is the Flag of England? Ye have but my sun to dare,
Ye have but my sands to travel. Go forth, for it is there!"
The West Wind called: -- "In squadrons the thoughtless galleons fly
That bear the wheat and cattle lest street-bred people die.
They make my might their porter, they make my house their path,
Till I loose my neck from their rudder and whelm them all in my wrath.
"I draw the gliding fog-bank as a snake is drawn from the hole,
They bellow one to the other, the frighted ship-bells toll,
For day is a drifting terror till I raise the shroud with my breath,
And they see strange bows above them and the two go locked to death.
"But whether in calm or wrack-wreath, whether by dark or day,
I heave them whole to the conger or rip their plates away,
First of the scattered legions, under a shrieking sky,
Dipping between the rollers, the English Flag goes by.
"The dead dumb fog hath wrapped it -- the frozen dews have kissed --
The naked stars have seen it, a fellow-star in the mist.
What is the Flag of England? Ye have but my breath to dare,
Ye have but my waves to conquer. Go forth, for it is there!"
"CLEARED"
Henry V; Act four: Scene 3It is Crispins day, and you are no gentlemen, nor men at all; you are not my brothers; you have not outlived the day. You have died; and gone quietly into your graves in doing so.
Willia Shakespeare
This day is called the feast of Crispin.
He that outlives this day, and comes safe home, Will stand a tip-toe when the day is named, and rouse him at the name of Crispin.
He that shall live this day, and see old age, will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbours, and say 'To-morrow is Saint Crispin:'
Then will he strip his sleeve and show his scars, and say 'These wounds I had on Crispin's day.'
Old men forget: yet all shall be forgot, but he'll remember with advantages what feats he did that day:
Then shall our names,
Familiar in his mouth as household words,
Harry the king,
Bedford and Exeter,
Warwick and Talbot,
Salisbury and Gloucester,
Be in their flowing cups freshly remember'd.
This story shall the good man teach his son;
And Crispin Crispin shall ne'er go by, from this day to the ending of the world, but we in it shall be remember'd;
We few,
we happy few,
we band of brothers;
For he to-day that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother;
be he ne'er so vile,this day shall gentle his condition:
And gentlemen in England now a-bed shall think themselves accursed they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap
whiles any speaks that fought with us upon Saint Crispin's day.
If you do not understand why these words are great.. if you do not understand why this day matters so, your manhoods ARE cheap; and you should indeed hold them so...
No, you cannot, for you have sold them, and sold them cheap; so you may pretend the world is no longer a rough place.
You are nothing but Quislings, cowering in your corners, praying for the bad men to go away, because they make you feel uncomfortable. Harry is dead, Horatius is gone, John Bull is but a parody; a memory of "the bad old days".
... Perhaps one more set of words from an English Man would be appropriate here
People sleep peaceably in their beds at night only because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf.
-- Eric Arthur Blair, known as George Orwell
