funeral processions standing out in sombre blackness against a lurid
nation. He has memories of funeral trains in little villages and in
great cities; he has memories of brave men standing as doorkeepers in
hotels, with arms gone, with crosses for bravery on their breasts, but
somehow the cloud of sorrow is always fringed with gold and silver. He
has memories of funeral services in Notre Dame and the Madeleine, and
in little towns all over France, but in and around them all there is
somewhere the glory of sunlight, of hope, of courage. Indeed, one
cannot have silhouettes, even of sorrow, if there is no background of
light and hope.

For we know that even in war-time God "still makes roses," as John
Oxenham, the English poet, tells us:

"Man proposes--God disposes;
Yet our hope in Him reposes
Who in war-time still makes roses."


John Oxenham, one of the outstanding poets of the war, wrote this
verse, and for me it has been a sort of a motto of faith during my
service in France. I have quoted it everywhere I have spoken, and it
has sung its way into my heart, like a benediction with its comfort and
its assurance.

It has been surprising, too, the way the boys have grasped at it. I
have quoted it to them privately, in groups, and in great crowds down
on the line, and back in the rest-camps, and in the ports, and
everywhere I have quoted it I have had many requests to give copies of
it to the boys. I quoted it once in a negro hut, hesitating before I