s a trench--on which a shell falls--and where one shell falls
another always follows in the same place;--the shell blows in a dugout
and there is little chance that the men sheltering therein shall be
alive, yet those on either side, knowing that another shell will fall
in a second or so, in utter forgetfulness of self leap in and with
their bare fingers scrape away the dirt lest haply there should be some
life yet remaining in this quivering, mangled human flesh.

Oh! What chances the men of earth have to-day to be as God! The
highest conception any religion has given us of God is that he is one
that would sacrifice himself--"Greater love hath no man than this that
he lay down his life for his friends"--and to-day they're doing it by
the million. Every moment is adding names to the honor-roll of heaven
of men who follow in His steps.

Have you conceived that the uniting together of the nations that love
peace in this struggle will do more to guarantee peace in the future
than anything else that has ever happened in world politics,--that it
will join France, Britain, and America into a trinity of free peoples
who will prevent war, at least for many generations? We are being
bound together by the strongest tie that ever tied nation to nation,
that ever bound one people to another, not by political treaties that
may be torn up, but by the great tie of common blood shed in a common
cause on a common soil. That narrow lane that stretches from
Switzerland to the sea is the great international cemetery, and for
many generations it will be the Mecca of pilgrimages from all our
countries. The wreaths of America will mingle with the immortelles of
France and the flowers from Britain and the pilgrims shall there get to
know, understand, and love each other as they engage in the holy task
of paying a common tribute to their common dead. Shall not the
mingling blood of Frenchmen, Britons, and Americans make the flowers of
peace to grow? They never had such soil before.

There is being created, also, in all our countries a new
aristocracy--the aristocracy of courage. We never had a chance up till
now to prove who were our real, our best people, and we have been
accustomed to measure our citizens by the false and small standards of
wealth, birth, and intellect. Well! There has been given to us to-day
a new standard whereby we can measure ourselves, the standard of
courage, sacrifice, and service. Nobody in England cares