Des Moines courier. ([Ottumwa] Iowa) 1848-1854, 1851-02-28
Selections from Whipple's Grafton.
q fine Analysis Of yVash;mgton's
! E-E- ---I Chm rac:cr. - --- ~

WOrld ncfliFdlou anu eHlStnd, we are
taught. by fine instinct to veDerate, and
| by wrong opinion TO rDisjudge. The
might Of his character has taken strong
hold upon the feelings of great masses
,f men, but in ,ranslatipg this universal
sentiment into an intelligent form, the
intellectual element of his wonderful
nature is as much depressed es the NOR
al element is exalted. and consequently
we are apt TO misunGerstand both. Me-
diocri,y has bad trick Of idealizing IL
self in eulogizing him and drags him
down To its own low level, while assu-
ming to lift him TO the skies. How ma
| ny times have we been told that he was
not man OF genius, but person Of
| i"excellent common sense" of .'admira-
BILE judgement" of .'rare virtues;" and
by a repetition of this odious cant we
have nearly succeeded in divorcing COM
prelenson from his sense, insight from
| his judgement, force from his virtues.
and life from, the man. Accordingly, in
the panegyric Of cold spirits, Washing
ton disappears in a cloud of common.
places; in the rhodomontade of boiling
patriots he expires in the agonics of ranI.
Now The sooner this bundle of medic.
ere talents and moral qualities, which its
contrivers have the audcity to call
George Washington, is Kissed out Of
existence, the better it will be for the
cause OF talent and the cause of morals;
contempt of that is the beginning of
wisdom. He had not genius, it seems.
! D no! genius, we must suppose, is the
peculiar and shining attribute of some
orator, whose tongue can spout patriotic
| speeches, or some versifier, whose muse
can "Hail Columbia" but not Of the
man who supported States on his arm,
| and carried America in his brain. Fhe
/ madcap Charles Townsend, the motion
of whose py-otechnic mind was like the
! whiz of hundred rockets, is man of
genius; but George Washington, raised
up above the level OF even eminent
statesmen, and with nature moving
with the still and orderly celebrity of a
planet round its sun--he dwindies, in
comparison, into a kind OF angelic dunce'
| What is genius? Is it worth anything?
| Is splendid folly the measure of its in-
spiration! Is wisdom its base and sum
mit-ihat which it recedes from, or
tends toward! And by what definition
do YOU award the name TO the creator of
an epic, and deny il TO the creator of a
country? On what principle is it to be
! lavished on him who sculptures in per.
4 ;-h;,.x -, rl,la ,lo ,o,oro ,f ,,ocs;Lla nv Z
cellence, and withheld from him who
buit up in himself transcendant char
acier, indestructible as the obligations of
Duty, and beautiful as her rewards! n
/ Indeed, If by the genius of action
YOU mean will enlightened by intelligence,
aud intelligence energized by wiii--il
force and insight be its characteristics.
and influence its test-and especially,
If great effects suppose cause proper
lionably great, that is, a vital causative
| mind-then is Washington most assured
| Iva man of genius. and one whom no
other American has equaled in the pow
er of working morally and mentally on
other minds. His genius, II is true, was
of a peculiar kind, the genius of char
acter, of thought and the objects OF
thought solidifed aud concentrated into
active faculty. He belongs TO that rare
! class of men--rare as Homers and Mil
ions-rare as Platos and Newtons--who
have impressed their characters upon na-
tions, without pampering national vices.
Such men have natures broad enough 10
i include all the facts of a peoples practi-
cal life, and deep enough 10 discern The
spiritual laws which underlie, animate,
and govern those facts. Washington, in
short had that greatness of character
which is the highest expression and last
result of greatest Of mind, for there is
no method of building up character ex.
q Gspt through mind. Indeed, character
| like his, is not 6,siil up, stone upon stone,
precepi upon precept. but gro,cs up,
Through an actual contact of thought with
4 things--the assimilitive mind transmit.
. ting the impalpable but potent spirit ol
public sentiment, and the life of visible
facts, and the power of spiritual laws, in.
! to individual life and power, SO that their
mighty energies put on personality, as il
were and act through one centralizing
human will. This process may not, il
you please, make the great philosopher,
or the great poet, but it does make the
great maa--ihe man in whom though
| and judgement seem identical with voli
) Etion--lhe man whose vital expression is
not in words, but deeds-the man whose
Sublime ideas issue necessarily in sub
lime acts, not in sublime art. II was De,
. cause Washing,on's character was thus
composed of the inmost substance and
/ power of facts and principles, that mer
instlnctively felt the perfect reality o.
his comprehensive manhood. This re.
! ality enforced universal respect, married
! strength to repose, and threw into his
face that commanding majesty, which
made men Of the speculative boldness
of Jefferson, and the lucid genius o
Hamilton. recognize, with unwonted
meeKness. his awful superiority. f'
!. But jou may say, how does this ac
count for Washington's virtues! Was
his disinteresiedness will! Was hi.
e patriotism intelligence! Was his NOR
, aiity genius! These questions should