Quotations About / On: SOLDIER

For the soldier of time, it breathes a summer sleep,

In which his wound is good because life was.
No part of him was ever part of death.
A woman smoothes her forehead with her hand
And the soldier of time lies calm beneath that stroke.

Vanity is so anchored in the heart of man that a soldier, a soldier's servant, a cook, a porter brags and wishes to have his admirers. Even philosophers wish for them. Those who write against vanity want to have the glory of having written well; and those who read it desire the glory of having read it. I who write this have perhaps this desire, and perhaps those who will read it.

The little toy dog is covered with dust,
But sturdy and stanch he stands;
And the little toy soldier is red with rust,
And the musket moulds in his hands.
Time was when the little toy dog was new,
And the soldier was passing fair;
And that was the time when our Little Boy Blue
Kissed them and put them there.

Just as I gave the command to charge I felt a stunning blow and found a musket ball had struck my left arm just above the elbow. Fearing that an artery might be cut, I asked a soldier near me to tie my handkerchief above the wound. I soon felt weak, faint, and sick at the stomach. I laid down and was pretty comfortable ... [but] seeing something going wrong and feeling a little easier, I got up and began to give directions about things; but after a few moments, getting very weak, I again laid down. While I was lying down I had considerable talk with a wounded [Confederate] soldier lying near me. I gave him messages for my wife and friends in case I should not get up. We were right friendly and jolly; it was by no means an unpleasant experience.

Few, few shall part, where many meet!
The snow shall be their winding sheet,
And every turf, beneath their feet,
Shall be a soldier's sepulchre.

'Stay—stay with us!—rest—thou art
weary and worn!'—
And fain was their war-broken soldier to stay;—
But sorrow return'd with the dawning of morn,
And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away.

Soldier: Hey colonel, I got me a prisoner. What should I do with him?
Col. John Marlowe: Spank him.

The actor can be compared to the soldier. The former dazzled by his triumphs, sighs continually for the struggles of stage- life; the latter filled with the glory he has acquired on the battlefield, cannot resign himself to peace.

These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.

As our actual present world ... shows itself more clearly—our world of an aristocracy materialised and null, a middle-class purblind and hideous, a lower class crude and brutal—we shall turn our eyes again, and to more purpose, upon this passionate and dauntless soldier of a forlorn hope.