ON the 12th of February, 1809, two babes were born--one in the woods of
Kentucky, amid the hardships and poverty of pioneers; one in England,
surrounded by wealth and culture. One was educated in the University of
Nature, the other at Cambridge.
One associated his name with the enfranchisement of labor, with the
emancipation of millions, with the salvation of the Republic. He is
known to us as Abraham Lincoln.
The other broke the chains of superstition and filled the world with
intellectual light, and he is known as Charles Darwin.
Nothing is grander than to break chains from the bodies of men--nothing
nobler than to destroy the phantoms of the soul.
Because of these two men the nineteenth century is illustrious.
A few men and women make a nation glorious--Shakespeare made England
immortal, Voltaire civilized and humanized France; Goethe, Schiller and
Humboldt lifted Germany into the light. Angelo, Raphael, Galileo and
Bruno crowned with fadeless laurel the Italian brow, and now the
most precious treasure of the Great Republic is the memory of Abraham
Lincoln.
Every generation has its heroes, its iconoclasts, its pioneers, its
ideals. The people always have been and still are divided, at least into
classes--the many, who with their backs to the sunrise worship the past,
and the few, who keep their faces toward the dawn--the many, who are
satisfied with the world as it is; the few, who labor and suffer for
the future, for those to be, and who seek to rescue the oppressed, to
destroy the cruel distinctions of caste, and to civilize mankind.
Yet it sometimes happens that the liberator of one age becomes the
oppressor of the next. His reputation becomes so great--he is so revered
and worshiped--that his followers, in his name, attack the hero who
endeavors to take another step in advance.
The heroes of the Revolution, forgetting the justice for which they
fought, put chains upon the limbs of others, and in their names the
lovers of liberty were denounced as ingrates and traitors.
During the Revolution our fathers to justify their rebellion dug down
to the bed-rock of human rights and planted their standard there. They
declared that all men were entitled to liberty and that government
derived its power from the consent of the governed. But when victory
came, the great principles were forgotten and chains were put upon the
limbs of men. Both of the great political parties were controlled
by greed and selfishness. Both were the defenders and protectors of
slavery. For nearly three-quarters of a century these parties had
control of the Republic. The principal object of both parties was the
protection of the infamous institution. Both were eager to secure the
Southern vote and both sacrificed principle and honor upon the altar of
success.
At last the Whig party died and the Republican was born. This party was
opposed to the further extension of slavery. The Democratic party of the
South wished to make the "divine institution" national--while the
Democrats of the North wanted the question decided by each territory for
itself.
Each of these parties had conservatives and extremists. The extremists
of the Democratic party were in the rear and wished to go back; the
extremists of the Republican party were in the front, and wished to go
forward. The extreme Democrat was willing to destroy the Union for the
sake of slavery, and the extreme Republican was willing to destroy the
Union for the sake of liberty.
Neither party could succeed without the votes of its extremists.
This was the condition in 1858-60.
When Lincoln was a child his parents removed from Kentucky to Indiana. A
few trees were felled--a log hut open to the south, no floor, no window,
was built--a little land plowed and here the Lincolns lived. Here the
patient, thoughtful, silent, loving mother died--died in the wide forest
as a leaf dies, leaving nothing to her son but the memory of her love.
In a few years the family moved to Illinois. Lincoln then almost grown,
clad in skins, with no woven stitch upon his body--walking and driving
the cattle. Another farm was opened--a few acres subdued and enough
raised to keep the wolf from the door. Lincoln quit the farm--went down
the Ohio and Mississippi as a hand on a flat-boat--afterward clerked
in a country store--then in partnership with another bought the
store--failed. Nothing left but a few debts--learned the art of
surveying--made about half a living and paid something on the
debts--read law--admitted to the bar--tried a few small cases--nominated
for the Legislature and made a speech.
This speech was in favor of a tariff, not only for revenue, but to
encourage American manufacturers and to protect American workingmen.
Lincoln knew then as well as we do now, that everything, to the limits
of the possible, that Americans use should be produced by the energy,
skill and ingenuity of Americans. He knew that the more industries we
had, the greater variety of things we made, the greater would be the
development of the American brain. And he knew that great men and great
women are the best things that a nation can produce,--the finest crop a
country can possibly raise.
He knew that a nation that sells raw material will grow ignorant and
poor, while the people who manufacture will grow intelligent and rich.
To dig, to chop, to plow, requires more muscle than mind, more strength
than thought.
To invent, to manufacture, to take advantage of the forces of
nature--this requires thought, talent, genius. This develops the brain
and gives wings to the imagination.
It is better for Americans to purchase from Americans, even if the
things purchased cost more.
If we purchase a ton of steel rails from England for twenty dollars,
then we have the rails and England the money; But if we buy a ton of
steel rails from an American for twenty-five dollars, then America has
both the rails and the money.
Judging from the present universal depression and the recent elections,
Lincoln, in his first speech, stood on solid rock and was absolutely
right. Lincoln was educated in the University of Nature--educated by
cloud and star--by field and winding stream--by billowed plains and
solemn forests--by morning's birth and death of day--by storm and
night--by the ever eager Spring--by Summer's wealth of leaf and vine and
flower--the sad and transient glories of the Autumn woods--and Winter,
builder of home and fireside, and whose storms without, create the
social warmth within.
He was perfectly acquainted with the political questions of the
day--heard them discussed at taverns and country stores, at voting
places and courts and on the stump. He knew all the arguments for and
against, and no man of his time was better equipped for intellectual
conflict. He knew the average mind--the thoughts of the people, the
hopes and prejudices of his fellow-men. He had the power of accurate
statement. He was logical, candid and sincere. In addition, he had the
"touch of nature that makes the whole world kin."
In 1858 he was a candidate for the Senate against Stephen A. Douglas.
The extreme Democrats would not vote for Douglas, but the extreme
Republicans did vote for Lincoln. Lincoln occupied the middle ground,
and was the compromise candidate of his own party. He had lived for
many years in the intellectual territory of compromise--in a part of
our country settled by Northern and Southern men--where Northern and
Southern ideas met, and the ideas of the two sections were brought
together and compared.
The sympathies of Lincoln, his ties of kindred, were with the South. His
convictions, his sense of justice, and his ideals, were with the North.
He knew the horrors of slavery, and he felt the unspeakable ecstasies
and glories of freedom. He had the kindness, the gentleness, of true
greatness, and he could not have been a master; he had the manhood and
independence of true greatness, and he could not have been a slave.
He was just, and was incapable of putting a burden upon others that he
himself would not willingly bear.
He was merciful and profound, and it was not necessary for him to read
the history of the world to know that liberty and slavery could not live
in the same nation, or in the same brain. Lincoln was a statesman..
And there is this difference between a politician and a statesman.
A politician schemes and works in every way to make the people do
something for him. A statesman wishes to do something for the people.
With him place and power are means to an end, and the end is the good of
his country.
In this campaign Lincoln demonstrated three things--first, that he was
the intellectual superior of his opponent; second, that he was right;
and third, that a majority of the voters of Illinois were on his side.