THE PSALM OF PENITENCE
I
Lord, at last thy wrath hurleth its thunderbolts upon our foreheads, and in the night our vessel strikes its prow against the rocks.
Lord, thou cuttest us down with the sword of the barbarian like fine wheat, and not one of the cravens that we shielded comes to our defence.
Lord, thou twistest us like a willow wand, thou breakest down to-day all our pride; there is none to envy us, who but yesterday were so proud.
Lord, our land goeth to ruin in war and strife; and if thou withhold thy mercy, great and small will devour one another.
Lord, thou art terrible, thou strikest us upon the back; in awful turmoil thou breakest our power, compelling us to confess past evil.
II
Lord, we had strayed away from the austerity of the old laws and ways. Virtues, domestic customs, we had destroyed and demolished.
Lord, giving an evil example, and denying thee like the heathen, we had one day closed up thy temples and mocked thy Holy Christ.
Lord, leaving behind us thy sacraments and commandments, we had brutally lost belief in all but self-interest and progress!
Lord, in the waste heavens we have clouded thy light with our smoke, and to-day the sons mock the nakedness and purity of their fathers.
Lord, we have blown upon thy Bible with the breath of false knowledge; and holding ourselves up like the poplar trees, we wretched beings have declared ourselves gods.
Lord, we have left the furrow, we have trampled all respect under foot; and with the heavy wine that intoxicates us we defile the innocent.
III
Lord, we are thy prodigal children, but we are thy Christians of old; let thy justice chastise us, but give us not over unto death.
Lord, in the name of so many brave men, who went forth fearless, valiant, docile, grave, and then fell in battle;
Lord, in the name of so many mothers, who are about to pray to God for their sons, and who next year, alas! and the year thereafter, shall see them no more;
Lord, in the name of so many women who have at their bosoms a little child, and who, poor creatures, moisten the earth and the sheets of their beds with tears;
Lord, in the name of the poor, in the name of the strong, in the name of the dead who shall die for their country, their duty, and their faith;
Lord, for so many defeats, so many tears and woes, for so many towns ravaged, for so much brave, holy blood;
Lord, for so many adversities, for so much mourning throughout our France, for so many insults upon our heads;
IV
Lord, disarm thy justice. Cast down thine eye upon us, and heed the cries of the bruised and wounded!
Lord, if the rebellious cities, through their luxury and folly, have overturned the scale-pan of thy balance, resisting and denying thee;
Lord, before the breath of the Alps, that praiseth God winter and summer, all the trees of the fields, obedient, bow together;
Lord, France and Provence have sinned only through forgetfulness; do thou forgive us our offences, for we repent of the evil of former days.
Lord, we desire to become men, thou canst set us free. We are Gallo-Romans, and of noble race, and we walk upright in our land.
Lord, we are not the cause of the evil, send down upon us a ray of peace. Lord, help our cause, and we shall live again and love thee.