America First Part 11

Where did Shakespeare get his genius? Where did Mozart get his music?

Whose hand smote the lyre of the Scottish plowman, and stayed the life of the German priest? G.o.d, G.o.d, and G.o.d alone; and as surely as these were raised up by G.o.d, inspired by G.o.d, was Abraham Lincoln; and a thousand years hence, no drama, no tragedy, no epic poem will be filled with greater wonder, or be followed by mankind with deeper feeling than that which tells the story of his life and death.

SECOND INAUGURAL ADDRESS

Delivered by Abraham Lincoln, March 4, 1865, on the occasion of his second inauguration as president of the United States.

FELLOW COUNTRYMEN:--At this second appearing to take the oath of the presidential office, there is less occasion for an extended address than there was at the first. Then a statement, somewhat in detail, of a course to be pursued, seemed fitting and proper. Now, at the expiration of four years, during which public declarations have been constantly called forth on every point and phase of the great contest, which still absorbs the attention and engrosses the energies of the nation, little that is new could be presented. The progress of our arms, upon which all else chiefly depends, is as well known to the public as to myself; and it is, I trust, reasonably satisfactory and encouraging to all. With high hope for the future, no prediction in regard to it is ventured.

On the occasion corresponding to this four years ago all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it--all sought to avert it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war--seeking to dissolve the Union, and divide effects, by negotiation. Both parties deprecated war; but one of them would make war rather than let the nation survive; and the other would accept war rather than let it perish. And the war came.

One eighth of the whole population were colored slaves, not distributed generally over the Union, but localized in the Southern part of it.

These slaves const.i.tuted a peculiar and powerful interest. All knew that this interest was, somehow, the cause of the war. To strengthen, perpetuate, and extend this interest was the object for which insurgents would rend the Union, even by war; while the government claimed no right to do more than to restrict the territorial enlargement of it.

Neither party expected for the war the magnitude or the duration which it has already attained. Neither antic.i.p.ated that the cause of the conflict might cease with, or even before, the conflict itself should cease. Each looked for an easier triumph, and a result less fundamental and astounding. Both read the same Bible, and pray to the same G.o.d; and each invokes his aid against the other. It may seem strange that any men should dare to ask a just G.o.d's a.s.sistance in wringing their bread from the sweat of other men's faces; but let us judge not, that we be not judged. The prayers of both could not be answered--that of neither has been answered fully.

The Almighty has his own purposes. "Woe unto the world because of offenses! for it must needs be that offenses come; but woe to that man by whom the offense cometh." If we shall suppose that American slavery is one of those offenses which, in the providence of G.o.d, must needs come, but which, having continued through his appointed time, he now wills to remove, and that he gives to both North and South this terrible war, as the woe due to those by whom the offense came, shall we discern therein any departure from those divine attributes which the believers in a living G.o.d always ascribe to him? Fondly do we hope--fervently do we pray--that this mighty scourge of war may speedily pa.s.s away. Yet, if G.o.d wills that it continue until all the wealth piled by the bondman's two hundred and fifty years of unrequited toil shall be sunk, and until every drop of blood drawn with the lash shall be paid by another drawn with the sword, as was said three thousand years ago, so still it must be said, "The judgments of the Lord are true and righteous altogether."

With malice toward none; with charity for all; with firmness in the right, as G.o.d gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in; to bind up the nation's wounds; to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan--to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.

ROBERT E. LEE

The following extracts are taken from the great lecture[4] of E.

Benjamin Andrews on "Robert E. Lee." Dr. Andrews was president of Brown University 1889-1898, superintendent of the Public Schools of Chicago 1898-1900, chancellor of the University of Nebraska 1900-1908, and since 1909 has been chancellor emeritus of that inst.i.tution. He served as a private, and later as second lieutenant in the Union army during the Civil War. He was wounded at Petersburg, losing an eye. Probably no better characterization or higher tribute has ever been made of Robert E. Lee than that by Dr.

Andrews in this lecture which was as enthusiastically received by the Union veterans of the North as by the Confederate veterans of the South; for, as Dr. Andrews says in his tribute to Lee, "None are prouder of his record than those who fought against him, who while recognizing the purity of his motive, thought him in error in going from under the stars and stripes."

Robert Edward Lee had perhaps a more ill.u.s.trious traceable lineage than any American not of his family. His ancestor, Lionel Lee, crossed the English Channel with William the Conqueror. Another scion of the clan fought beside Richard the Lion-hearted at Acre in the Third Crusade. To Richard Lee, the great land owner on Northern Neck, the Virginia Colony was much indebted for royal recognition. His grandson, Henry Lee, was the grandfather of "Light-horse Harry" Lee of Revolutionary fame, who was the father of Robert Edward Lee.

Robert E. Lee was born on January 19, 1807, in Westmoreland County, Va., the same county that gave to the world George Was.h.i.+ngton and James Monroe. Though he was fatherless at eleven, the father's blood in him inclined him to the profession of arms, and when eighteen,--in 1825,--on an appointment obtained for him by General Andrew Jackson, he entered the Military Academy at West Point. He graduated in 1829, being second in rank in a cla.s.s of forty-six. Among his cla.s.smates were two men whom one delights to name with him--Ormsby M. Mitchel, later a general in the Federal army, and Joseph E. Johnston, the famous Confederate. Lee was at once made Lieutenant of Engineers, but, till the Mexican War, attained only a captaincy. This was conferred on him in 1838.

In 1831 Lee had been married to Miss Mary Randolph Custis, the grand daughter of Mrs. George Was.h.i.+ngton. By this marriage he became possessor of the beautiful estate at Arlington, opposite Was.h.i.+ngton, his home till the Civil War. The union, blessed by seven children, was in all respects most happy.

In his prime Lee was spoken of as the handsomest man in the army. He was about six feet high, perfectly built, healthy, fond of outdoor life, enthusiastic in his profession, gentle, dignified, studious, broad-minded, and positively, though un.o.btrusively, religious. If he had faults, which those nearest him doubted, they were excess of modesty and excess of tenderness.

During the Mexican War, Captain Lee directed all the most important engineering operations of the American army--a work vital to its wonderful success. Already at the siege of Vera Cruz, General Scott mentioned him as having "greatly distinguished himself." He was prominent in all the operations thence to Cerro Gordo, where, in April, 1847, he was brevetted major. Both at Contreras and at Churubusco he was credited with gallant and meritorious services. At the charge up Chapultepec, in which Joseph E. Johnston, George B. McClellan, George E.

Pickett, and Thomas J. Jackson partic.i.p.ated, Lee bore Scott's orders to all points until from loss of blood by a wound, and from the loss of two nights' sleep at the batteries, he actually fainted away in the discharge of his duty. Such ability and devotion brought him home from Mexico bearing the brevet rank of colonel. General Scott had learned to think of him as "the greatest military genius in America."

In 1852 Lee was made superintendent of the West Point Military Academy.

In 1855 he was commissioned lieutenant-colonel of Col. Albert Sidney Johnston's new cavalry regiment, just raised to serve in Texas. March, 1861, saw him colonel of the First United States Cavalry. With the possible exception of the two Johnstons, he was now the most promising candidate for General Scott's position whenever that venerable hero vacated it, as he was sure to do soon.

Lee was a Virginian, and Virginia, about to secede and at length seceding, in most earnest tones besought her distinguished son to join her. It seemed to him the call of duty, and that call, as he understood it, was one which it was not in him to disobey. President Lincoln knew the value of the man, and sent Frank Blair to him to say that if he would abide by the Union he should soon command the whole active army.

That would probably have meant his election, in due time, to the presidency of his country. "For G.o.d's sake don't resign, Lee!" General Scott--himself a Virginian--is said to have pleaded. He replied: "I am compelled to; I cannot consult my own feelings in the matter."

Accordingly, three days after Virginia pa.s.sed its ordinance of secession, Lee sent to Simon Cameron, Secretary of War, his resignation as an officer in the United States army.

Few at the North were able to understand the secession movement, most denying that a man at once thoughtful and honorable could join in it. So centralized had the North by 1861 become in all social and economic particulars, that centrality in government was taken as a matter of course. Representing this, the nation was deemed paramount to any state.

Governmental sovereignty, like travel and trade, had come to ignore state lines. The whole idea and feeling of state sovereignty, once as potent North as South, had vanished and been forgotten.

Far otherwise at the South, where, owing to the great size of states and to the paucity of railways and telegraphs, interstate a.s.sociation was not yet a force. Each state, being in square miles ample enough for an empire, retained to a great extent the consciousness of an independent nation. The state was near and palpable; the central government seemed a vague and distant thing. Loyalty was conceived as binding one primarily to one's own state.

It is a misconception to explain this feeling--for in most cases it was feeling rather than reasoned conviction--by Calhoun's teaching. It resulted from geography and history, and, these factors working as they did, would have been what it was had Calhoun never lived. These considerations explain how Colonel Lee, certainly one of the most conscientious men who ever lived, felt bound in duty and honor to side with seceding Virginia, though he doubted the wisdom of her course.

Most striking among the characteristics of General Lee which made him so successful was his exalted and unmatched excellence as a man, his unselfishness, sweetness, gentleness, patience, love of justice, and general elevation of soul. Lee much loved to quote Sir William Hamilton's words: "On earth nothing great but man: in man nothing great but mind." He always added, however: "In mind nothing great save devotion to truth and duty." Though a soldier, and at last very eminent as a soldier, he retained from the beginning to the end of his career the entire temper and character of an ideal civilian. He did not sink the man in the military man. He had all a soldier's virtues, the "chevalier without fear and without reproach," but he was glorified by a whole galaxy of excellences which soldiers too often lack. He was pure of speech and of habit, never intemperate, never obscene, never profane, never irreverent. In domestic life he was an absolute model. Lofty command did not make him vain.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ROBERT E. LEE]

That Lee was brave need not be said. He was not as rash as Hood and Cleburne sometimes were. He knew the value of his life to the great cause, and, usually at least, did not expose himself needlessly.

Prudence he had, but no fear. His resolution to lead the charge at the b.l.o.o.d.y Angle--rashness at once--shows fearlessness. Tender-hearted as he was, Lee felt battle frenzy as hardly another great commander ever did.

From him it spread like magnetism to his officers and men, thrilling all as if the chief himself were close by in the fray, shouting, "Now fight, my good fellows, fight!" Yet such was Lee's self-command that this ardor never carried him too far.

But Lee possessed another order of courage infinitely higher and rarer than this--the sort so often lacking even in generals who have served with utmost distinction in high subordinate places, when they are called to the sole and decisive direction of armies: he had that royal mettle, that preternatural decision of character, ever tempered with caution and wisdom, which leads a great commander, when true occasion arises, resolutely to give general battle, or a swing out away from his base upon a precarious but promising campaign. Here you have moral heroism; ordinary valor is more impulsive. A weaker man, albeit total stranger to fear, ready to lead his division or his corps into the very mouth of h.e.l.l, if commanded, being set himself to direct an army, will be either rash or else too timid, or fidget from one extreme to the other, losing all.

It was in this supreme kind of boldness that Robert Lee preeminently excelled. Cautious always, he still took risks and responsibilities which common generals would not have dared to take, and when he had a.s.sumed these, his mighty will forbade him to sink under the load. The braying of bitter critics, the obloquy of men who should have supported him, the shots from behind, dismayed him no more than did Burnside's cannon at Fredericksburg. On he pressed, stout as a t.i.tan, relentless as fate. What time bravest hearts failed at victory's delay, this Dreadnaught rose to his best, and furnished courage for the whole Confederacy.

In a sense, of course, the cause for which Lee fought was "lost"; yet a very great part of what he and his _confreres_ sought, the war actually secured and a.s.sured. His cause was not "lost" as Hannibal's was, whose country, with its inst.i.tutions, spite of his genius and devotion, utterly perished from the earth. Yet Hannibal is remembered more widely than Scipio. Were Lee in the same case with Hannibal, men would magnify his name as long as history is read. "Of ill.u.s.trious men," says Thucydides, "the whole earth is the sepulcher. They are immortalized not alone by columns and inscriptions in their own lands; memorials to them rise in foreign countries as well--not of stone, it may be, but unwritten, in the thoughts of posterity."

Lee's case resembles Cromwell's much more than Hannibal's. The _regime_ against which Cromwell warred returned in spite of him; but it returned modified, involving all the reforms for which the chieftain had bled. So the best of what Lee drew sword for is here in our actual America, and, please G.o.d, shall remain here forever.

Decisions of the United States Supreme Court since Secession gave a sweep and a certainty to the rights of states and limit the central power in this republic as had never been done before. The wild doctrines of Sumner and Thaddeus Stevens on these points are not our law. If the Union is perpetual, equally so is each state. The republic is "an indestructible Union of indestructible states." If this part of our law had in 1861 received its present definition and emphasis, and if the Southern States had then been sure, come what might, of the freedom they actually now enjoy each to govern itself in its own way, even South Carolina might never have voted secession. And inasmuch as the war, better than aught else could have done, forced this phase of the Const.i.tution out into clear expression, General Lee did not fight in vain. The essential good he wished has come, while the republic with its priceless benedictions to us all remains intact. All Americans thus have part in Robert Lee, not only as a peerless man and soldier, but as the st.u.r.dy miner, sledge-hammering the rock of our liberties till it give forth its gold. None are prouder of his record than those who fought against him, who, while recognizing the purity of his motive, thought him in error in going from under the stars and stripes. It is likely that more American hearts day by day think lovingly of Lee than of any other Civil War celebrity save Lincoln alone. And his praise will increase.

OUR REUNITED COUNTRY

Speech of Clark Howell at the Peace Jubilee Banquet in Chicago, October 19, 1898, in response to the toast "Our Reunited Country: North and South."

MR. TOASTMASTER, AND MY FELLOW COUNTRYMEN:--In the mountains of my state, in a county remote from the quickening touch of commerce, and railroads and telegraphs--so far removed that the sincerity of its rugged people flows unpolluted from the spring of nature--two vine-covered mounds, nestling in the solemn silence of a country churchyard, suggest the text of my response to the sentiment to which I am to speak to-night. A serious text, Mr. Toastmaster, for an occasion like this, and yet out of it there is life and peace and hope and prosperity, for in the solemn sacrifice of the voiceless grave can the chiefest lesson of the Republic be learned, and the destiny of its real mission be unfolded. So, bear with me while I lead you to the rust-stained slab, which for a third of a century--since Chickamauga--has been kissed by the sun as it peeped over the Blue Ridge, melting the tears with which the mourning night had bedewed the inscription:--

"Here lies a Confederate soldier.

He died for his country."

The September day which brought the body of this mountain hero to that home among the hills which had smiled upon his infancy, been gladdened by his youth, and strengthened by his manhood, was an ever memorable one with the sorrowing concourse of friends and neighbors who followed his shot-riddled body to the grave. And of that number no man gainsaid the honor of his death, lacked full loyalty to the flag for which he fought, or doubted the justice of the cause for which he gave his life.

Thirty-five years have pa.s.sed; another war has called its roll of martyrs; again the old bell tolls from the crude latticed tower of the settlement church; another great pouring of sympathetic humanity, and this time the body of a son, wrapped in the stars and stripes, is lowered to its everlasting rest beside that of the father who sleeps in the stars and bars.

There were those there who stood by the grave of the Confederate hero years before, and the children of those were there, and of those present no one gainsaid the honor of the death of this hero of El Caney, and none were there but loved, as patriots alone can love, the glorious flag that enshrines the people of a common country as it enshrouds the form that will sleep forever in its blessed folds. And on this tomb will be written:

"Here lies the son of a Confederate soldier, He died for his country."

And so it is that between the making of these two graves human hands and human hearts have reached a solution of the vexed problem that has baffled human will and human thought for three decades. St.u.r.dy sons of the South have said to their brothers of the North that the people of the South had long since accepted the arbitrament of the sword to which they had appealed. And likewise the oft-repeated message has come back from the North that peace and good will reigned, and that the wounds of civil dissention were but as sacred memories. Good fellows.h.i.+p was wafted on the wings of commerce and development from those who had worn the blue to those who had worn the gray. Nor were these messages delivered in vain, for they served to pave the way for the complete and absolute elimination of the line of sectional differences by the only process by which such a result was possible. The sentiment of the great majority of the people of the South was rightly spoken in the message of the immortal Hill, and in the burning eloquence of Henry Grady--both Georgians--the record of whose blessed work for the restoration of peace between the sections becomes a national heritage, and whose names are stamped in enduring impress upon the affection of the people of the Republic.