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Howe, Julia Ward 1819-

Author; born in New York, May 27, 1819; educated privately; married in 1843

Julia Ward Howe.

Samuel Gridley Howe (q. v.), with whom prior to the Civil War she conducted the Boston Commonwealth, an anti-slavery paper. After the war she became actively [434] interested in the cause of peace, woman suffrage, prison reform, and other movements. For many years she was a Unitarian preacher and a popular lecturer. She wrote the Battle hymn of the republic (see below); Passion flowers; Words for the hour; A trip to Cuba; The world's own; From the Oak to the olive; Later lyrics; Sex and education; Memoir of S. G. Howe; Life of Margaret Fuller; Modern Society; Is polite Society polite? from sunset Ridge, etc.

Battle hymn of the republic.

Mine eye hath 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 rows of burnished 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.


Harper and Brothers Publishers. . New York. 1902.

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