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ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S CARDINAL TRAITS
A STUDY IN ETHICS
WITH AN EPILOGUE ADDRESSED TO THEOLOGIANS
_BY_
C. S. BEARDSLEE
BOSTON: RICHARD G. BADGER
THE GORHAM PRESS
THE COPP CLARK CO., LIMITED
TORONTO
_Copyright 1914, by C. S. Beardslee_
_All rights reserved_
_The Gorham Press, Boston, U. S. A._
_To my sister Alice--
A living blend
Of love and loyalty,
Of modesty and immortal hope._
PREFACE
Abraham Lincoln was a man among men. He was earnest and keen. He was
honest and kind. He was humble and inwardly refined. He was a freeman
in very deed. His conscience was king.
These few words contain the total sum of the following book. In
unfolding what they severally mean, and what their living unison
implies, the aim has been to bring to view the clear and simple beauty
of a noble personality; to show how such a human life contains the
final test of any proper claim in all the bounds of Ethical research;
and to stir in thoughtful minds the query whether such a character as
Lincoln's life displays, instinct as it is with Godliness, may not
yield forms of statement ample and exact enough for all the essential
formulas of pure Religion.
Assuredly his aspirations were ideal. Quite as certainly his ways with
men were practical. The call and need today of just his qualities are
past debate.
If only in our national senate chamber the ever-shifting group of
senators could hear the voice of Lincoln at every roll-call and in
each debate! If only in all our universities our studious youth could
glean each day from Lincoln, as he speaks of politics and of logic, of
ethics and of history! If only in every editorial room, where current
events are registered and reviewed, Lincoln's wit and wisdom might
illumine and advise! If only at every council, conference, or
convention, where leaders of our churches debate religious themes, the
reverence of Lincoln might preside! If only in the council chambers
where directors meet to plan and govern our modern enterprises in
industry and finance, Lincoln's broad humaneness might be felt! If
only every artist at his exalted and elusive task could every day
obtain new views of Lincoln's full nobility! If only toilers in the
shop and field could feel each day the friendly brotherhood in
Lincoln's rough, hard hand!
Then toil, while losing naught of eagerness, would become content.
Art, while losing naught of beauty, would become unfailingly
ennobling. Commerce, while losing naught of enterprise, would grow
benign. Religion, while retaining a becoming dignity, would not fail
to be sincere. The public press would grow more savory and sane. Our
schools would be nurseries of manliness. And our conscience would be
embodied in our law.
But Lincoln's face is vanished. Lincoln's voice is hushed. What
remains is that Lincoln's sentiments be republished every day in lives
that reverence and reproduce his excellence. To indicate this path, to
embolden and embody this aspiration is the service this volume
undertakes.
Throughout this study, thought is fastened centrally upon Lincoln's
last inaugural address. There Lincoln stands complete. And that
completeness is vividly conscious in Lincoln's own understanding.
Eleven days after its delivery, and one month before his death, he
wrote to Thurlow Weed, saying that he expected that speech "to wear as
well as--perhaps better than--anything I have produced." Of almost
incredible brevity, containing as it left his hands, but five short
paragraphs, the compass and burden of thought within that address are
every way notable. It is in fact Lincoln's digest of the course and
trend of our national life; while on the side of character it is
replete with telling intimations of Lincoln's own moral effort,
purpose, and point of view. Here are in visible action all the
elements of essential manhood, all the virtues of a balanced
character. Here are insight, judgment, resolution. Here is momentum.
Here is something that endures. Here are ends worth any cost. Here is
wariest use of means. And here are wrongs, engendering anguish, and
mortal strife. And here are ultimate alternatives. And all is grasped
and even merged in Lincoln as he speaks. Here is wealth of ready
matter and direct allusion quite enough for any volume to lay open and
assess.
Such a moral inventory and evaluation this study undertakes. Its
method is to subject this short address to the strictest ethical
analysis, to identify the elements that are integral and cardinal in
the moral being of God, and man, and government. Then, to articulate
and unify these elements into a vital ethical synthesis, to
demonstrate and manifest the living unison of character. Then, to
designate and undertake to clarify the major problems which such an
analysis and such a synthesis of such a speech and such a man open to
a student's mind.
In this procedure it is the aim to show how from first to last in
Lincoln's life his mental clarity and his moral honesty are held in
model parity; how in his daily walk law and liberty go hand in hand;
how his cardinal moral qualities are to be defined; and how these
elemental virtues may avail in their own authority and right to guide
the eyes of men towards beauty, to guard the souls of men against
despair, to find the stable base of government, to overcome all guilt
by grace, to prove the perfect manliness of patience, to ground the
thought of men upon reality, to pierce the gloom of woe, to find the
core of piety, to perfect persuasive speech, and to win a vision of
the soul. Hereby and thus it may at last stand plain that in the soul
of Lincoln there is a moral universe; and that within the verities and
mysteries of this universe he alone is truly wise and fully free who
knows and proves the worth of faith.
That so broad a study should be based upon so brief a speech, or
indeed upon Lincoln's single personality, may seem to some a fatal
fault. Such a thought, when facing such a method and such a theme, is
surely natural. As to its validity there need be no debate. The field
is free. Let any number of other speeches, or of other people be
assembled and placed beside the material handled in this book, for its
re-examination. In such a process, the further it is pursued, if only
Lincoln and the words of this inaugural are also held in thorough and
continual review, it may come the more fully clear that in a theme
like ethics mere multitude is not the measure of immensity; that the
structure of this book is organic, not mechanical; that the single
chapter on Lincoln's Moral Unison comprehends all that the volume
anywhere contains or intimates; that all the problems handled in Part
IV are only sample studies, and handled only suggestively; that the
volume might be expanded indefinitely or much reduced, and its
significance remain in either case unchanged; that correspondingly
Lincoln's last inaugural and Lincoln's public life, each and both,
outline in very deed a moral universe; that to rightly understand this
single character and this one address is to understand humanity, and
identify the ethical finalities; that to scan the soul of Lincoln in
his religious attitudes is to gaze upon God's image, and face the
reality and the rationale of the true religious life; and that, in
consequence, any reader who hesitates to venture such vast conclusions
upon so scant material may finally be induced to submit to a
substantial remeasurement his present estimates of brevity and
breadth.
CONTENTS
PART I. INTRODUCTION
Lincoln's Mental Energy
Lincoln's Moral Earnestness
PART II. ANALYSIS
His Reverence for Law--Conscience
His Jealousy for Liberty--Free-will
His Kindliness--Love }
His Pureness--Life }
} The Cardinal Virtues
His Constancy--Truth }
His Humility--Worth }
PART III. SYNTHESIS
Lincoln's Moral Unison
PART IV. STUDIES
His Symmetry--The Problem of Beauty
His Composure--The Problem of Pessimism
His Authority--The Problem of Government
His Versatility--The Problem of Mercy
His Patience--The Problem of Meekness
His Rise from Poverty--The Problem of Industrialism
His Philosophy--The Problem of Reality
His Theodicy--The Problem of Evil
His Piety--The Problem of Religion
His Logic--The Problem of Persuasion
His Personality--The Problem of Psychology
PART V. CONCLUSION
Lincoln's Character
Lincoln's Preference
AN EPILOGUE--Addressed to Theologians
LAST INAUGURAL ADDRESS
LINCOLN'S CARDINAL TRAITS
PART I. INTRODUCTION
LINCOLN'S MENTAL ENERGY
In ethics, if anywhere, a master needs to be mentally sane and strong.
Truth cannot be trifled with here. Error here, whether in judgment or
as to fact, is fatal. Insight to exactly discern, and balance to
considerately compare must be the mental instincts of a moralist.
How was this with Lincoln? What was his outfit and what his discipline
mentally? Was he unfailingly shrewd? Was he sufficiently sage? Was he
by instinct and by habit truly an explorer and a philosopher? Did he
have in store, and did he have in hand, the needful wealth of
pertinent facts? Had he the logical strength and breadth to set them
all in order and to see them all as one?
Such inquiries are severe--too severe to be pressed or faced by anyone
in haste. But in this study of Lincoln such inquiries are not to be
escaped. To fairly answer them is worth to any man the toil of many
days. For just as surely as such research is resolutely pushed through
all its course, the eye will come to see where wisdom dwells, and to
learn what mental judgment and mental insight truly mean. And it will
grow clear as day that Lincoln mentally, as well as physically, was no
weakling; that in intellect, as in stature, he stands among the first.
In many places this stands clear. There is no better way to trace it
out than to start from his last inaugural. To fully explore one single
paragraph of this address, the paragraph with which it opens, will
make one's examination of Lincoln's mental competence all but
complete. Its opening sentence alludes to his first inaugural. That
one allusion will repay pursuit.
There Lincoln assumed the presidency. In that act and under that oath
he stepped to the executive headship of the Republic. By that step he
faced seven states in secession. It was a civil crisis, never one more
grave, or dark, or ominous. It threatened to subvert our national
history and to undermine our national hope. It was crowding on towards
bloody war a debate that dealt with the very basis of manhood in men.
To see the meaning of that crisis and to govern its issue required an
eye and a mind of Godlike vision and poise.
Here is an excellent place to examine the outfit and the action of
Lincoln's intellect. His first inaugural is a masterpiece of
intellectual equipoise and energy. Any mind that will fasten firmly
upon the substance and the sequence of its thought may feel distinctly
the struggle, and the strength, and the steadiness of Lincoln's mind.
His arguments and his admonitions are impressive models of sanity and
power. Which is the more notable, his insight or his outlook, it is
hard to tell. The marvel is that the soberness and the force of his
appeal rest quite as firmly upon the prophetic as upon the historic
base. So clear is his grasp of the past, so sure is his sense of the
present, and so deliberate is the poise of his judicial thought that
his vision into the future has been found by time to be unerringly
true.
Let any student put this to test. That address is an appeal. From
beginning to end it pleads. Set all its parts asunder. Then bind them
all together as Lincoln has done. And so find out what are its
elements; whence they are gathered; what is fact; what is principle;
what is prophecy; on what plan they are assembled; by what art they
are displayed; to what they owe their force; if in any spot of its
argument there is a break; and if the onset of the whole is
irresistible. Distinct replies to these distinct inquiries will tell
one all he needs to know about Lincoln's mental strength. Without
wandering any further one can find that Lincoln's methods and
conquests attest a student's patience, and a scholar's power; that his
wisdom was ripe, entirely adequate to devise safe counsel for a Nation
in civil strife.
A striking feature of the address is its philosophic finish. Though
solidly set in concrete facts, and fitted ideally to the day of its
delivery, it is replete with counsel good for every time, so phrased
as to become the very proverbs of civil politics. Total paragraphs are
little more than clustered apothegms of consummate statesmanship. To
get the style and cast of Lincoln's mind let any student comprehend
the girth, and ponder the weight of each following sentence, all
gathered from this one address:--
The intention of the lawgiver is the law.
I hold that in contemplation of universal law, and of the
Constitution, the Union of these States is perpetual.
Perpetuity is implied, if not expressed, in the fundamental law of all
national governments.
It is safe to assert that no government proper ever had a provision in
its organic law for its own termination.
Continue to execute all the express provisions of our national
Constitution, and the Union will endure forever.
Can a contract be peaceably unmade by less than all the parties who
made it?
That in legal contemplation the Union is perpetual is confirmed by the
history of the Union itself.
No State upon its own mere motion can lawfully get out of the Union.
Think, if you can, of a single instance in which a plainly written
provision has ever been denied.
All the vital rights of minorities and of individuals are so plainly
assured to them by affirmations and negations, guarantees and
provisions in the Constitution, that controversies never arise
concerning them.
If the minority will not acquiesce, the majority must, or the
government must cease.
If a minority in such case will secede rather than acquiesce, they
make a precedent which in turn will divide and ruin them.
Plainly the central idea of secession is the essence of anarchy.
A majority, held in restraint by constitutional checks and
limitations, and always changing easily with deliberate changes of
popular opinions and sentiments, is the only true sovereign of a free
people.
Unanimity is impossible.
One section of our country believes slavery is right and ought to be
extended, while the other believes it is wrong and ought not to be
extended. This is the only substantial dispute.
Physically speaking we cannot separate.
Can aliens make treaties easier than friends can make laws?
Can treaties be more faithfully enforced between aliens than laws
among friends?
Suppose you go to war, you cannot fight always.
This country, with its institutions, belongs to the people who inherit
it.
The chief magistrate derives all his authority from the people.
Why should there not be a patient confidence in the ultimate justice
of the people?
If the Almighty Ruler of nations, with his eternal truth and justice,
be on your side of the North, or on yours of the South, that truth and
that justice will surely prevail by the judgment of this great
tribunal of the American people.
This people have wisely given their public servants but little power
for mischief.
Nothing valuable can be lost by taking time.
Here are six and twenty sentences, culled from this one address, that
are nothing less than the maxims of a political sage, as lasting as
they are apt. As a glove fits a hand, so did these counsels fit that
day. As the needle guides all ships that sail, so their wisdom directs
all politics still. They embody sure witness of an eye that is keen to
see--none more narrowly; and of a mind that is trained to think--none
more thoroughly. Their author was a man who knew. He knew the past. He
knew things current. He knew what their coming issues were sure to be.
He knew the grounds of government. He knew the omens of anarchy. He
knew the awful possibilities in fraternal hate. And he knew the need
and the awful cost of patient forbearance. Here is a man well past
childhood intellectually. He has the eye and the mind of a man long
schooled by discipline. And he has a tongue expert in speech, well
freighted with tremendous sense, but lucid too, and graceful, and void
of all offense. This one address displays a man, though pathetically
unfamiliar with childhood schools, of consummate intellectual balance
and force.
But, for its cherished end this inaugural proved pathetically
incompetent. And when it became his duty to pronounce a second
inaugural oath, the Nation had been four years in terrible war. That
war levied a terrible tax upon the president's intellectual strength.
The mental perplexities of those endless days and nights cannot be
told. Much less can they be understood. It may be doubted whether any
other man could have brought a mind to uphold and command those years
with any approach to Lincoln's mental honesty. It was, under God,
within the steadfast, tenacious grasp of Lincoln's exhaustless and
invincible mental loyalty that our national destiny lay secure. To all
the phases of all the problems of all those years, and to his own
judgment and endeavor concerning them all, this same first paragraph
of his second inaugural also alludes. This allusion, too, if any one
would compass the full measure of Lincoln's mental strength, demands
review, and will reward pursuit. The records are well preserved. And
they bear abounding witness to Lincoln's almost superhuman sanity and
insight and energy and mental equilibrium. If any one will follow
through this honest and perfectly honorable hint, he will come to feel
that the mind of Lincoln was the Nation's crucible in which all the
Nation's problems were resolved.
LINCOLN'S MORAL EARNESTNESS
In the central paragraph of his last inaugural Lincoln enshrined
compelling demonstration of his moral soundness. That single paragraph
is nothing less than a solid section of a finished moral philosophy.
It reckons right and wrong incapable of any reconciliation, God as
Almighty Judge, and all his judgments just. But that opinion was no
word in haste. Deliberate as he always was, when voicing any estimate
as President, never was he more deliberate than when penning that
moral explanation of the war. In four stern years he had
been revolving surveying and pondering that sternest of all
debates:--Should the war go on or should it cease? Every argument on
either side, that heart or thought of man could feel or see, had been
driven by every sense into the faithful heed of his honest soul. He
bent his ear obediently to every plea, binding his patient mind to
register fairly every weighty word, designing with absolute honesty
that, when at last he spoke the executive decree, his decision should
bind the Nation for the single perfect reason that it was right. And
when finally and persistently he upheld the war and ordered its
relentless prosecution to the end, no one may truthfully charge that
opinion and command to ignorance or malice, to prejudice or haste.
Moral grounds alone were the basis and motive of that conclusion and
behest. The war was caused by slavery. With Southern success slavery
would spread and become perpetual. If slavery was not wrong, nothing
was wrong. That this great wrong should be restrained and in the end
removed, the war must be put through.
But that was not all his thought and argument in this last inaugural.
The war, for the time, parted the Nation sectionally. But the sin and
guilt of slavery, in Lincoln's feeling, rested upon the Nation as a
whole; and upon the Nation as a whole he adjudged the burden of its
woe. Here the moral grandeur of Lincoln comes fully into view. His
affirmation of that awful iniquity, inwrought in two centuries and a
half of slavery, is no pharisaic indictment of the South. It is a
repentant confession of his own and all the Nation's equal part in its
infinite wrong. Among the guilty authors and abettors of that wrong he
identifies himself. He deems the war God's righteous judgment upon the
national inhumanity, and meekly bows his head, among the humblest and
most afflicted of those who suffer and sorrow beneath that scourge.
That kindly fellowship with all the Nation in the sorrows of the war,
with its lowly confession of all the guilt, and its patient endurance
of all the atoning cost, proclaims and demonstrates that Lincoln's
respect for righteousness was supreme. It betokens a living sense of
law, a hearty assent to duty, a careful reckoning of guilt, an
uncomplaining readiness to own and rectify all wrong, a manly purpose
to inaugurate a new rule of equity, a reverent acknowledgment of God,
an ideal esteem for manhood everywhere, freedom from the dominion of
greed, friendliness for the erring, pity for the hurt and poor. Above
all it shows the faith of a moral seer in its manifest confidence that
human evil, and all its awful sorrow, are under the joint divine and
human control and can be absolutely and joyfully overthrown and done
away.
Here is a type of manhood that, under the discipline of God, grew
sterling to the core, and by a signal favoring Providence provided an
ample basis for a national moral ideal. Here is an ideal where
conscience and righteousness stand in close affiance, where liberty
springs from equity, and where pity never fails. Here is a person and
a name worthy and able demonstrably to inspire and lead to national
triumph a new political league. And here is an official whose
spontaneous honesty has left upon all his state papers an indelible
moral stamp, creating thereby out of his official documents a national
literature of finished beauty and excellence and power.