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Julia Ward Howe

Battle Hymn of the Republic

Mine eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord;

He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of wrath are stored;

He hath loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible swift sword;

His truth is marching on.


I have seen Him in the watch-fires of a hundred circling camps,

They have builded Him an altar in the evening dews and damps;

I can read His righteous sentence by the dim and flaring lamps:

His day is marching on.


I have read a fiery gospel, writ in burnished rows of steel:

"As ye deal with My contemners, so with you My grace shall deal;

Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent with his heel,

Since God is marching on."


He has sounded forth the trumpet that shall never call retreat;

He is sifting out the hearts of men before His judgment seat:

Oh! be swift, my soul, to answer Him! be jubilant, my feet!

Our God is marching on.


In the beauty of the lilies Christ was born across the sea,

With a glory in His bosom that transfigures you and me;

As he died to make men holy, let us die to make men free,

While God is marching on.