God As We See Him

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We stick it out by believing that we're in the right--to believe you're in the right makes a lot of difference. You glance across No Man's Land and say, "Those blighters are wrong; I'm right." If you believe that with all the strength of your soul and mind, you can stand anything. To allow yourself to be beaten would be to own that you weren't.

To still hold that you're right in the face of armed assertions from the Hun that you're wrong, requires pride in your regiment, your division, your corps and, most of all, in your own integrity. No one who has not worn a uniform can understand what pride in a regiment can do for a man. For instance, in France every man wears his divisional patch, which marks him. He's jolly proud of his division and wouldn't consciously do anything to let it down. If he hears anything said to its credit, he treasures the saying up; it's as if he himself had been mentioned in despatches. It was rumoured this year that the night before an attack, a certain Imperial General called his battalion commanders together. When they were assembled, he said, "Gentlemen, I have called you together to tell you that tomorrow morning you will be confronted by one of the most difficult tasks that has ever been allotted to you; you will have to measure up to the traditions of the division on our left--the First Canadian Division, which is in my opinion the finest fighting division in France." I don't know whether the story is true or not. If the Imperial General didn't say it, he ought to have. But because I belong to the First Canadian Division, I believe the report true and set store by it. Every new man who joins our division hears that story. He feels that he, too, has got to be worthy of it. When he's tempted to get the "wind-up," he glances down at the patch on his arm. It means as much to him as a V. C.; so he steadies his nerves, squares his jaws and plays the man.

There's believing you're right. There's your sense of pride, and then there's something else, without which neither of the other two would help you. It seems a mad thing to say with reference to fighting men, but that other thing which enables you to meet sacrifice gladly is love. There's a song we sing in England, a great favourite which, when it has recounted all the things we need to make us good and happy, tops the list with these final requisites, "A little patience and a lot of love." We need the patience--that goes without saying; but it's the love that helps us to die gladly--love for our cause, our pals, our family, our country. Under the disguise of duty one has to do an awful lot of loving at the Front. One of the finest examples of the thing I'm driving at, happened comparatively recently.