More than 80 years ago, on the second night of the Fall ofNanjing, John Rabe opened his diary to record what he had seen and heard that day when he found a piece of paper. It was a poem:

LIFE

Every beat of the pulse — the faith to win

Every coming of daylight -- endless struggle

Life.

Death doesn't scare us—

Every silence

Emerges the will of

Life.

We abhor

Hypocrisy and giving up halfway.

We adore

Freedom and brightness

This is our life.

Every beat of the pulse — the faith to win

Every coming of daylight -- endless struggle

The sacred heritage of our fathers and the earth are

Good fortunes of this life, people, and country.

Rabe's wife Dora slipped the poem into his diary. Rabe read the poem again and again every day during the dangerous days he stayed in Nanjing, and every time he read the poem, he was inspired and thought of his beloved wife. Mr. Rabe wrote in his diary: "If life is at stake every moment, it is a very solemn thing to read the poem -- thank you, my wife!"

To love! To life! To peace!