What theme is best revealed by this conflict?

sadness can destroy people.
one must mourn before moving on.
many lives are lost too soon in battle.
people are haunted by lost souls.

Most children brought up in brooklyn before the first world war remember day there with a peculiartenderness. it was the day children went around "ragamuffin" or "slamming gates," wearing costumes topped off by apenny maskbased on this excerpt, what is the author's purpose in writing?