{
 "id": "henry-van-dyke-jr/the-peaceful-warrior",
 "title": "The Peaceful Warrior",
 "ordinal": null,
 "subtitle": null,
 "poet": "Henry van Dyke Jr.",
 "poet_slug": "henry-van-dyke-jr",
 "language": "en",
 "book": "The Poems of Henry Van Dyke",
 "book_slug": "poems",
 "book_kind": "volume",
 "sequence": 123,
 "container": null,
 "epigraph": null,
 "first_published": {
  "year": 1920,
  "venue": "The Poems of Henry Van Dyke (1920)",
  "note": "Taken from the 1920 collected edition. That is the printing this text comes from, not the poem's first appearance: the volume gathers work published from 1897 onward, and which earlier book or magazine printed this poem first has not been established here.",
  "uncertain": true,
  "sources": [
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsofhenryvand00vandrich"
  ]
 },
 "source": {
  "kind": "standard-ebooks",
  "repo": "standardebooks/henry-van-dyke-jr_poetry",
  "file": "poetry.xhtml",
  "upstream": [
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   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/16134",
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   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3525",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/9372",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/29314",
   "https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/43094",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsofhenryvand00vandrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/buildersotherpoe00vandrich",
   "https://archive.org/details/toilingoffelixan00vandiala",
   "https://archive.org/details/musicotherpoems0000henr_c7v6",
   "https://archive.org/details/poemsnowfirstcol00vanduoft",
   "https://archive.org/details/songsoutofdoors0000vand",
   "https://archive.org/details/thyseaisgreatour00vandiala",
   "https://archive.org/details/chosenpoems0000vand"
  ],
  "rights": "public domain (SE dedication; underlying text pre-1931)"
 },
 "verification": {
  "level": "structural-only",
  "last_checked": "2026-08-20"
 },
 "stats": {
  "n_lines": 20,
  "n_stanzas": 5,
  "n_parts": 0,
  "longest_line_chars": 36,
  "max_indent": 1
 },
 "site_ready": true,
 "parts": [],
 "stanzas": [
  [
   {
    "text": "I have no joy in strife,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Peace is my great desire;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Yet God forbid I lose my life",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Through fear to face the fire.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "A peaceful man must fight",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For that which peace demands⁠—",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Freedom and faith, honor and right,",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Defend with heart and hands.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Farewell, my friendly books;",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Farewell, ye woods and streams;",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "The fate that calls me forward looks",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "To a duty beyond dreams.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Oh, better to be dead",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "With a face turned to the sky,",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Than live beneath a slavish dread",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "And serve a giant lie.",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ],
  [
   {
    "text": "Stand up, my heart, and strive",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "For the things most dear to thee!",
    "indent": 1
   },
   {
    "text": "Why should we care to be alive",
    "indent": 0
   },
   {
    "text": "Unless the world is free?",
    "indent": 1
   }
  ]
 ]
}