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L’EMPIRE C’EST LA PAIX

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Publishing Committee · Battle Creek, Mich. · Nov 3, 1859

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 14, No. 24.

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“L’EMPIRE C’EST LA PAIX.”

From Punch.
When will incorrigible doubts be dumb? When will injurious suspicions cease? Proclaim anew, with cannon, fife and drum, “The Empire is Peace—is surely Peace!”
Where is not record of the blessed truth? Read on Sevastopol’s blood-boltered stones; Read, all the way from Petersburg to Pruth, On steppe and waste, in heaps of whitening bones— “The Empire is Peace!”
Read, in the rice fields on Ticino’s bank, Where the green blades wave greener for the slain; In the blood-fattened grasses that grow rank From the death-pits on Solferino’s plain— “The Empire is Peace!”
Read, in each cold and desolate French hearth, Bereft of brother, husband, son or sire; Read in the rapine, ravage, scathe and dearth, Through Piedmont wrought by hostile sword and fire— “The Empire is peace!”
Read, in the brow of England grimly bent, Her hands all busy with the gear of war; In voted war tax and hot armament, And out-look as for foemen, near and far— “The Empire is Peace!”
Read, in the gathering hosts along the Rhine, The cannon bristling on each forest front, The turfed and angled earthwork’s sheltering lines, On Scheldt or Meuse, against invasion’s brunt— “The Empire is Peace!”
Read, in the gloom, as of the thunder cloud, The stir, as of a pent volcano’s power, Where, free awhile to speak her thoughts aloud, Italy, sad and stern, awaits the hour, “The Empire is Peace!”
And if the records of the truth be weak, To sweep your sudden doubts, like dreams, away, With trumpet-tongue let the armed thousands speak— Who late through Paris marched in war array— “The Empire is Peace!”