C. M. Stevens

“ The preservation of the Union, regardless of all the turmoil and clamor on other issues, was the one clear-sighted object of Lincoln. It is quite true that up to the beginning of the war there was little sentiment in the North for the abolition of slavery. It was the beginning of war that crystalized resentment against slave-holding power, because it was thus capable of destroying the union in the furtherance of its own dominion. But never was a nation more divided into mutually injurious confusions. It is always so in democracies where every one thinks, talks and acts. ”

“ Lincoln’s life has much more for American youth than the adventure-story of a backwoods boy of pioneer days on his unknown way to be a hero of American history. What Lincoln thought he was and what he made out of his relations with those around him are only incidental to the inspiring patience with which he kept the faith of high meaning within him, and the labor with which he strove on until his ideal came clear as one of the supreme visions of humanity. ”

“ Abraham Lincoln, as President of the United States and Commander-in-Chief of its army and navy, never seemed to know that he was any more bound to look out for the good opinion of the world than at any time before. To him there was no such thing as presidential attitude or pose. He did not see that he had any part to act out more than he had always had. Life might be a stage, as Shakespeare had described it, and Lincoln had played many parts, but it was always as a man. ”

“ The boy who reads the story of Lincoln, desiring to get real help in building his life, will find no miracle nor any short-cuts to get easily the ambitions of life. Lincoln did not know the office he wanted to hold, but he knew the kind of man he wanted to be and he worked unceasingly to reach that ideal of mind and manhood. In proportion, it is no harder now to know more than others, in order to be correspondingly useful to others, than it was in Lincoln’s time. ”

“ Washington and Lincoln reached the heights from which they saw together one vision of the Promised Land, “ordained from the foundations of the world” for the chosen order of human evolution. They wanted no “entangling alliances” with a foreign order, or a fragmentary system of human freedom. Americans have so far kept the peace with the uncompromised moral law of the “free and equal” rights of man. America is dedicated to the proposition that a compromised order of freedom and equality, either through treaty or war, shall never invade the Western Hemisphere. ”

“ Lincoln’s great passion for friendship in the midst of his prophetic vision is shown in the last paragraph of his first inaugural address. He said, “I am loath to close. We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained, [Pg 134] it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched as they surely will be, by the better angels of our nature.” ”

“ The bonds that unite us as one People,—a substantial community of origin, language, belief and law; common, national and political interests ... these bonds of union are of perennial force and energy, while the causes of alienation are imaginary, factitious and transient. The heart of the People, North and South, is for the Union.... The weary masses of the people are yearning to see the dear old flag floating over their capitols, and they sigh for the return of peace, prosperity and happiness, which they enjoyed under a government whose power was felt only in its blessings.... ”

“ But, there is a patriotic masterpiece of Lincoln’s thought, which, with the reinforcement of occasion and place, such as the field of Gettysburg was, contains all the unmeasurable and priceless meaning of Lincoln for American patriotism and the manhood of America. It is his address of dedication on the battlefield of Gettysburg. In effect on the human mind, it probably can never be surpassed as a message of political freedom for the rights of man. ”

“ In behalf of all humanity, whose ideal is divine, whose first memory is Thine image lost, and whose last hope is Thine image restored, and especially of our own nation, whose history has been so favored, whose position is so peerless, whose mission is so sublime, and whose future so attractive, we thank Thee for the unspeakable patience of Thy compassion, and the exceeding greatness of Thy loving kindness.... ”

“ The pioneer and the frontiersman were laboring to achieve something far more important than clearing away trees, killing wildcats or subduing the wild men of the wilderness. Such dangerous and exciting work was but an incident in the great struggle. They were striving for a safe, free and sufficient living for family and home. But far greater than the economic interest was the ideal interest of freedom from the will of overlords. That sublime goal of human endeavor is probably no nearer the heart’s desire now than it was then. ”

“ But we did not yet have clear the meaning of America, and through yet more years of even worse suffering, involving the Civil War, we freed ourselves from the war-making methods and masteries entrenched within our own government. Out of that political turmoil of minds appeared another American, Abraham Lincoln, whose life represents supremely the most important possibilities in the meaning and ideal of America. To know the mind-making process that developed Washington and Lincoln is to know not only the meaning but also the mission of America. ”

“ Lincoln’s life may be prized as much in what he did for himself as in what he did for his country, because in the course of our interest they mean the same and become the same. He has shown to every American boy that the right desire, no matter what the circumstances and conditions, will invariably lead along the right way to the successful life, because the successful character is a successful career for a successful humanity. ”

“ Emancipation Statue of Lincoln—Washington, D. C.
Carlyle says that “sincerity, a deep, great, genuine sincerity, is the first characteristic of all men in any way heroic. All great men have this as the primary material in them.” This is why the so-called “art for art’s sake” never can be great. It is sincerity for merely formal success, and not for the spirit of “life more abundantly.” Formal efficiency is achieved only in the complicated training of an extended education, but social efficiency of immeasurably greater value is the simplicity of knowledge. ”

“ The wilderness never brought forth a more wonderful being than the child that became one of the greatest names in the history of America. Deep in the wild woods of Kentucky, in the humblest conditions of nature, farthest from the inventions of society, there arose a mind that gave great riches of thought to the making of civilization.
Lincoln and his sister “hired out,” and the position of servant can hardly be servile or menial with such an illustrious American example, unless the master make it so. ”

“ If the people had not believed in him he would never have had the confidence to develop his way of life, able at last to face the world-making problems of the great Civil War, and thus to hold to a course of conduct, which he knew to be right, against the hisses, slander and desperate intrigue of men and masses, who knew that he was making a civilization in America contrary to their mercenary interests and their customary moral standards. ”

“ From that time on he had before him the vision of a great American. Washington became his ideal type of character, and that ideal no doubt helped much to make him the patient power he was in the great crisis of his nation’s existence.
The rough and hard never hurt any one if they are healthy interests; the rude and uncultured wrong no taste if they are moral; and poverty injures nobody when it is clean and persevering and safe. ”

“ If that life can be separated enough from the political turmoil so as to be seen and to be given a worthy interpretation, there is thus a service that may be worth while for the American youth.
Heroes have been made in many a historical crisis and they represent some splendid devotion to a single idea of human worth, but Lincoln’s heroism was the far severer test of a hard struggle through many years. He came near encountering every discouragement and in mastering every difficulty that may befall any American from the worst to the best, and from the lowliest to the most responsible position. ”

“ As “a house divided against itself cannot stand,” so, a civilization cannot stand whose humanity is divided into the three special interests known to us as individuals, the nation and an alien world.
The human task of conscience and reason, made clear in the progress of experience, finds the humanity of child, mother and man in all its relations and interests, or it has not found God or the meaning of the Universe. ”

“ The American vision of moral freedom and social righteousness can in no way be made clearer than in studying the process of development that individually prepared Washington and Lincoln to be the makers and preservers of a developing democracy for America and for the American mind of the world.
Lincoln’s early life has interest and meaning only for those who are seeking to understand the pioneer political principles, fundamental in character and civilization, out of which could develop a mind and manhood equipped for the greatest and noblest of human tasks. ”

“ To an insignificant interruption on an insignificant occasion, one of those famous sayings popped up, as it were from the mass of thinking in Lincoln’s mind, “You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all of the time.” ”

“ But this was Lincoln’s whole life and his neighbors knew it. They told other people that he was a man to be trusted until at last the whole world knew it, and the historians recorded it among the imperishable records of civilization.
A nation is rich as it has such ideals of character, especially in this kind striving on from the lowliest to the highest, through the destitution and discouragement that may drag down the aspiring dream of better life. ”

“ Washington’s struggle and patience against adversities and confusions, through his long career as leader in the making of the Union, was doubtless an ever present example and consolation to Lincoln in the no less stupendous task of preserving the Union.
Laboulaye, the French Statesman says, “History shows us the victory of force and stratagem much more than of justice, moderation and honesty. It is too often only the apotheosis of triumphant selfishness. There are noble and great exceptions; happy those who can increase the number, and thus bequeath a noble and beneficent example to posterity. ”

“ Any boy or girl can appreciate the events that entered into the making of Lincoln’s mind and character, but only a student of statesmanship and history can read beyond this and appreciate the almost superhuman task which Lincoln carried through to the extinction of slavery and the preservation of the United States of America. ”

“ History finds that he was a prophet of ideal humanity, the farthest possible from despotic sovereignties. Dynastic states can never fight for a democratic government merely to preserve it, and democracies can never fight merely to preserve a party in power. It may very well be doubted that the North could have won the Civil War if there had not been involved the moral issues of human slavery. England would surely have intervened for the starving workers of their cottonmills, but the workers refused to have their cause supported by fastening slavery upon any part of the human race. ”

“ To take his “backwoods” experiences and their comparatively uncouth incidents, as interesting merely because they happened to a man who became famous, is to miss every inspiration, value and meaning so important in building his way as man and statesman. To read the early incidents of Lincoln’s life for the isolated interest of their being the queer, peculiar or pathetic biography of a notable character has little that is either inspiring or informing to a boy in the light of present experiences and methods of living. ”

“ Edward Everett, as the orator of the day, said in the course of his scholarly address, “As my eye ranges over the fields whose sod was so recently moistened by the blood of gallant and loyal men, I feel, as never before, how truly it was said of old, ‘it is sweet and becoming to die for one’s country.’ I feel, as never before, how justly from the dawn of history to the present time, men have paid the homage of their gratitude and admiration to the memory of those who nobly sacrificed their lives, that their fellowmen may live in safety and honor.... ”

“ Washington fought for national independence and triumphed, making his country an example to mankind. Lincoln drew a reluctant sword to save those great ideas, essential to the life and character of the republic. ”

“ The American boy, seeing anything of great interest accomplished, wants to know how it was done. That is true all the way from winning some game at play to making a million in some great enterprise. But far more, in fact immeasurably more, is the making of a masterful mind, the development of a nation-making character, and of a world-historical man. Such was Abraham Lincoln, who was built up from what seems to be nothing on to the very highest worth of mankind. ”