But humanity does need sacrifice upon the one great Altar, every day and all days. The Cenotaph rising in our midst may be our altar. We may leave our flowers there, the incense-smoke of burning hearts, but the flowers should be our lives. The Cenotaph after all is only the visible sign of the great invisible Cenotaph of humanity which stands in the midst of the ages, an empty tomb in memory of all those who have gone before--of those whose sacrifice _without ours_ is not perfect. * * * * * At Westminster Abbey they have buried the dead soldier among poets and statesmen. They have dug up from France Tom, Dick, or Harry, one of us, unnamed, unknown, who laughed and talked and marched and fired and suffered in the war, one of the many who are always unknown. He did guard duty no doubt in France. He is put on sentry again. Touching as it is to have a soldier in the dim light of the Abbey where so many can shed invisible tears, it had been better perhaps in a stern era to have posted him at St. Stephen's, at the entry to Parliament, that he might challenge in his silence all who enter there to stand for England-- "Who goes there?" "Friend." "Advance and be recognised!" "Pass, friend!" Proceed at your peril if you cannot meet the challenge of the dead! PRINTED BY CASSELL & COMPANY, LIMITED, LA BELLE SAUVAGE, LONDON, E.C.4 F.100.121 +-----------------------------------------------+ | Transcriber's Note: | | | | Inconsistent hyphenation and spelling in the | | original document have been preserved. | | | | = sign denotes bold type | | | | Typographical errors corrected in the text: | | | | Page 99 Algeerians changed to Algerians | +-----------------------------------------------+ End of Project Gutenberg's The Challenge of the Dead, by Stephen Graham