[Paul F. Huebner, in the Tribune, Lynwood, California]

From the earliest times men have built memorials of stone in memory of their war dead.... In the year 1863, Lincoln stood on the battlefield of Gettysburg and said, "It is for us, the living, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced."

I propose that we, the living, be now dedicated to the unfinished task of really ending war and of making our world safe for democracy; that we now build, in honor of our war dead, a new memorial, not made of stone, a monument of world peace.... Let us who believe in the Prince of Peace ... dare to erect a new memorial, one dedicated to human brotherhood.

wrote McCrae. Let us take the torch and hold it high and let us move forward in its light to end war.

Let us build them a new memorial—world peace.

[From the New Outlook, Toronto, Ontario, Canada]

The eleventh of November is a day that the world will not soon forget. How we shall celebrate it in the far-distant future can only be conjectured, but it is not likely that we shall ever quite forget to celebrate it....

Remembrance Day is for remembering, and not, surely, for boisterous rejoicing and celebration. And it must be that it is for the cherishing of the memory of those who went from us during that long-drawn-out agony of the war, a memory, not so much of what they did as of what they were, of the spirit that was in them and the brave front with which they faced the tragedy of the end. If they could come back to us today, the last thing they would wish would be that we should ask them to join in parade or mimic warfare or any rejoicing over the triumphs or glory of the struggle. In the clearer light of their day, that must all seem very empty and of little worth.

We shall remember them best and cherish their memory in the finest way only as we keep before us the things which they today might think of as most worth while. What they would be we might not be able to say definitely, but we do know that their vote would be for peace and brotherhood and a vastly kindlier day than that which brought them to their earthly end. What mockery it would be as we think of them to prate of the glories of war or sing any song of triumph for victories won through its horrors!

What we do with our Remembrance Day will tell on the days and the years that are to come. A reverent and intelligent celebration of it will help to build up within us thoughts and feelings of sympathy and kindliness, while a boastful and braggart celebration will breed anything but a peaceful mood. While we honor our dead, and speak high words of their valor, and courage, and endurance, we cannot afford to set further away the things for which they gave their lives, if there was any reason or justification for giving their lives at all.

We ought, therefore, to dedicate our Remembrance Day to the great cause of peace and good will throughout the earth. Only in such a way will we be able to keep it sacred,... a worthy memorial of those whom we have loved and whose brave deeds and heroic courage we would keep alive forevermore. Only in that mood will we do them the honor they deserve; only in that mood will we win through to the things for which they died.

[Editorial in the New Egypt Press, New Jersey]

When men ... think they can live without friends, neighbors, and loved ones, they are on the wrong track. When self-gain and political power make them forget God and man, they are bound to fail. It is true that they may overrule and override the weak and those in need for a while, but it cannot last long.

Dr. Albert Shaw in ... World's Work has the following to say along this line. He says: "It was the peculiar and unique achievement of Jesus that, amid the elaboration of systems of every kind, he discerned the innermost secret of life itself, and that secret was love. It was not love as a mere emotion. It was love as a strict equation. 'Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.' The whole of what has been called his plan of salvation, his organization of rescue, his liberations, and his development of abundance, is founded on this reciprocity; life in the life of others, the life that is love. Unless we live for others, so he taught, we do not live at all.

"Mankind is still staggered by this ... paradox and rebels against it. But we are learning by hard experience that there is no way of living at all unless we live for others. It is the rule of the family. It must become the rule of society and of nations. Commercially, we cannot export unless we import. Strategically, we cannot have security unless there is security around us. Socially, our institutions cannot be stable unless stability is guaranteed in the world as a whole. What may be referred to as the policy of Christ is not only the best policy. It is the only policy, and unless it be adopted, our empires, like the Roman Empire, must be exposed to the evils that tend to disintegration.

"Today there is much talk of war. It is very serious talk with a sinister meaning for all of us. But they who take the sword have been duly warned by Jesus that they shall perish by the sword. Swords are fatal boomerangs, as history has proved. Many an emperor, kaiser, king, and statesman has had good reason, during all these sad years of turbulence, disorder, and disaster, to regret that he once thought so lightly of his reasonable warning. The successors are afraid, and rightly so. Victors in great wars are little better off than the losers. Vanquished empires may revive, while victor states fall heir to all manner of evils—decline, bankruptcy, decadence. The Saviour, earliest of pacifists, knew whereof he spoke."

[Editorial in the Maritime Baptist, Kentville, Nova Scotia, Canada]

Armistice Day has come round again—the day which the love, the pride, the gratitude of the nation have set apart as an anniversary consecrated to the memory of its heroic dead. Today there will be held once again, not only at the Cenotaph in Whitehall, but in every town, village, and hamlet throughout the land, those brief but deeply moving services of remembrance and of prayer which still make so strong an appeal to all those who passed through the ... experiences of 1914-1918....

And it is good to be able to realize, as we do, that underneath the multitude of mingled, undefined emotions—the remembrances, the hopes, the sorrows—which this day evokes there has always lain, and still lies, a deep sense of religion.

Armistice Day is a day which never fails to carry the thoughts of millions, even if only for a brief moment, up to God.

It is a day when those religious instincts which, in spite of all outward appearances to the contrary, really lie deep within the heart of the nation, rise to the surface, manifest themselves, and become articulate....

It is just this heart of religion within our people which causes public opinion to demand that the commemoration of Armistice Day shall take the form of a religious service, and which makes the two minutes' silence to be not merely an act of remembrance, but of remembrance before God.

Let us not be ashamed of this deep-lying religious instinct, for it is, if we only knew it, just precisely the very best thing about us—the thing which, as a nation, makes us great. In our hearts we do believe in God, and turn instinctively to Him at the times when we are deeply moved, and find prayer rising from our lips....

And therefore the first duty of each of us, both towards our valiant dead and towards the whole world, is surely to set aside resolutely this spirit of incipient despondency and pessimism and to lift up our heads and put our faith afresh in God and to believe, with new hope, in His readiness to guide our feet into the way of peace, if only we will let ourselves be led by His spirit.

[James R. Angell, President of Yale, as quoted in the New York Times, New York]

The elimination of war will never be achieved by wishful thinking or by mere appeal to emotion, however important these may be in the converting of humane thought into effective deed. It will come, if ever, by slow and painstaking education, when a full understanding of war's monstrous futility, not less than an appreciation of its inevitable toll of human suffering and misery, both for victor and for vanquished, are ineradicably implanted in the mind of man.

And with such illumination must and will come the recognition and acceptance of adequate moral equivalents for war. Daring, courage, endurance, loyalty, love of country, and the other patriotic and martial virtues, among which are counted many of the finest traits of which humanity is capable, are not lightly to be laid aside. They must be translated and sublimated to heroic ends which are compatible with peace.

[The Archbishop of Canterbury, as quoted in the Christian World, London, England]

Beyond all doubt, there is throughout the world a deep and ardent longing for peace. We believe that the overwhelming majority of men and women in every country desire that international disputes should be settled by peaceable means....

To us Christians, however unworthy of our vocation we may have been, it is a matter of conviction that God our Father wills that nations, as well as individuals, should live as members of one family, that what He wills is possible, and that His help is pledged to us in the effort to achieve it. To refuse to take the next step forward towards the goal is, for us, not only folly, but sin. But we believe that many who may not share our religious conviction will share our belief that the present hour is in the highest degree critical in human history and that, at this time, all national and party interests should be subordinated to the supreme interest of securing the peace of the world.