A Christmas Message
I heard the bells on Christmas day
Their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet the words repeat
Of peace on earth, goodwill to men.
Born in 1807 in Portland, Maine, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow was regarded as one of America’s greatest poets. His life, however, was one marked by tragedy. Married in 1831, by 1834 Longfellow was viewed as one of the country’s most respected scholars. He had just moved to Massachusetts and was teaching at Harvard. Yet, tragically, within a year of his move to Massachusetts, his wife became ill and died.
In an effort to deal with his grief, he poured himself into his teaching. It took seven years before he recovered enough from his loss to remarry. With a new love, it seemed that the good life had returned. The Longfellows welcomed five children into their family.
However, at the very moment when Henry should have been celebrating the joys brought by his talents, financial security, and stature, tragedy again struck. In 1861, while lighting a match, Longfellow’s second wife’s clothes caught fire and she burned to death. Then, even before he could regain his stride, his faith was again challenged by the American Civil War.
Longfellow hated the Civil War. It tore at the very fiber of his being to see the United States – a nation his family had fought to create and help build – divided by the greed and sinful nature of humanity. An ardent believer in the power of God to move earth, the poet all but pleaded with God to end the madness of the war. When his eldest son, nineteen-year-old Charles, was wounded in battle and sent home to recover, the poet’s prayers turned to rage.
As Henry tended his son’s injuries, saw other wounded soldiers on Cambridge’s streets, and visited with families who had lost sons in battle, he asked his friends and his God, “Where is the peace?” Then, picking up his pen and paper, he tried to answer that haunting question.
And in despair I bowed my head:
“There is no peace on earth,” I said,
“For hate is strong and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, goodwill to men.”
Where is the peace? Isn’t that the same question we can ask to today? The hate seems so strong. It still mocks the song. Where is the peace on earth and goodwill to all?
But Longfellow never gave up hope on his God. He never gave up hope that God would win in the end. And so he ends his poem with the following stanza – a stanza that gives us hope this Christmas season, a stanza that says there is indeed hope for all and peace and goodwill. In the end, Longfellow’s poem would not only inspire the Union but the whole world, even today.
Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail,
With peace on earth, goodwill to men.”
~Michelle