If We Must Die

Passage:
"If we must die, let it not be like hogs
Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot,
While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs...
...Though far outnumbered let us show us brave,
And for their thousand blows deal one deathblow!"

Comment and Response:
(C) Although this poem was written for a specific event, this quote can be connected to any war time.  The one war that this makes think of the most is WWII because of how the Jews were killed by mass murder in the concentration camps. In a way you could call the concentration camps the "inglorious spot" and the Jews the "hogs" that get corralled into those places the same that pigs are before they are slaughtered. The Nazi officers would be the "mad and hungry dogs" which gave the order to kill the Jews. The other war that this reminds of is the Battle of Thermopylae which was adapted into a major motion picture by the name of 300. In that battle the Spartans, although vastly outnumbered, stood strong and fought there hardest until they were defeated and killed. The last two lines of the passage some up the Spartans perfectly in that battle, "Though far outnumbered let us show us brave, And for their thousand blows deal one deathblow!" I took this to mean that it doesn't matter how big they are or how hard they hit, the thing that matters is that you stood up to them and got that one hit in.