Who sinks in Freedom’s battle
Weep not that they should fall;
Howe’er their souls have flown, released
By scaffold, steel or ball,
Theirs is not death—eternal,
Like stars that gem the skies,
They live to tell of higher things—
The true man never dies.
Weep not—though women’s wailings
Ascend, and hearts may break
For voices hushed and hands grown cold
And eyes that ne’er shall wake;
Weep not—or if the tears will swell,
Let shame their well-spring be
That men should live nor dare the deeds
That make a people free.
The dead who fell for Freedom,
Say not they fell in vain,
Their blood is seed that, hundred-fold,
Springs into life again.
It whispers to the listening world
The lessons of the past,
And feeds the fire that shall not fail
Till Fraud goes down at last.
The dead who fell for Freedom,
Grave, grave, their names on high,
That stainless youth and manhood stern
Shall still know how to die—
That still the march shall onward be,
Whate’er the path may bar,
Up to the heights lit by the sun,
Where Peace and Freedom are.