New-York daily tribune., 1865-09-23
MONUMENTS AND MEMORIALs'


funds for monuments to his memory were
started in all our cities. We do not propose u
explore these enterprises, or to inquire aS "
their fulfllment. Lincoln's memory rests III So
broad a sanctuary of the popular heart that We
have no anxiety for his monument. But so iai'
nothing has been done toward engraving Dis
name in our public places. The Philadelphia
movement, to make general Soldiers home'
70 he named after him, has had short spasni'
and we hear no more of it. We allude 10 thiS
undertaking because it suggests the most "a
tional way we can conceive OF commemoraling
the late President.
If so moderate degree of interest has been
taken in the Lincoln monument funds, 1t Is De-
cause they labor with no union OF aims, ana ior
no specific and well-guaranteed object Every
town in the United States would want Lincoln
monument. so that marble would become re-
dundant and commonplace. Remembering
what host of Washington funds and begging
fund committees have been before the public
TO so little aesthetic effect in the last twenty
war and its glorious sacrifices that 1t turned the
weak deluge of safe patriotism that was so last
making the reverence of Washington "wishy-
washy." Our generation, We trust, will not
repeat the same vapidity Of praise with respect
TO the fame Of Abraham Lincoln. Many a
noble grave needs its monument, beside that
halowed one in Illinois; and each State and
city must not neglect the business of idealizing
some Of its native heroes Yet We tremble
when town committees take hold Of architec-
ture, when the only qualification Of certain al
dermen for serving on monument committee
is that they weigh 90 stone or so; for, under
such preponderances, our heroes, instead o
being resurrected to pedestals, are more in
danger of being buried in their statues on top OF
the ruins of art. Mr.. Lincoln's true monument
will await the peoples genius, and sculptor as
heroic. Meanwhile there are more sensible and
useful ways Of commemorating the President
than by building him thirty monuments in thirty
cities.
We need a National Soldiers Hospital and
Home like that of Greenwich, in England. II
the Government cannot afford the cost OF such
q structure. the nation will cheerfully yield IL
support, knowing the object Is national, and
will in a manner both patriotic and philan
thropic characterize and celebrate the name o.
Lincoln. This is one way in which We car
aiIix the tribute of posterity; there are others
as well for our brave soldiers slain as for {
President murdered. But before stating these
let us remark that every State which designs tC
erect hospital for its soldiers can do it also "a
them.
i Msn0mer and weak nomenclature are, as the
Travelled and untrayeled are aware, some of the
literary vices of our rapid settlements. Our
map il continued reduplication ofnames from
! Maine to Georgia. A nations map should be lis
history, and 50 with a town. The streets OF
! Charleston reflect its traditions; so with large
parts Of New-York, Philadelphia and Boston.
But in two of these great cities are neghbor-
hoods innocently devoted to prejudice by
being ineuphoniously christened after men of
whom nobody has ever heard outside
Of their prccincts-indi1eren councilmen, job
bers, dry goods men, as ambitious to have their
names painted on the street-coners as young
Mr.. Smith to have his patronymic knitted out
at the Catskills or Niagara. Then, too, we
have the sensible idea of numbering the streets,
running, We fear, into tedum and excess. 1t
would be just as well, in many respects, to
have the numbers with name beside. Here,
too, is q way Of introducing more history into
the streets of New-York. Our avenues, which
are rot so many as to need ndispensably the
designation of figures, would bear more honor
ably the names Of the noble men who fell in the
war or came out of it with laurcls. The term
of Filth-avenue, for instance, is meaningless to
represent or adorn one of our wealthiest and
most palatial highways. Should we not have in.
stead, an Avenue Grant, and Avenues Sherman,
Sheridan, Wadsworthl We shall not 90 over
all the illustrious names We could select.
Moreover, the great Park OF the Continent has
a neutral and little-meaning appellation-Cen-
trail Park. Give the name of the late President
to this splendid peoples estate, and New-York
will have erected to his memory, anj at no cost
whatever for the purpose, one of the grandest
and most beautiful memorials that can be
imagined. We throw out these hints with a
hope that they will not be lost upon the progress
OF the continents capital and metropolis.
.zz.rz~ur.s.-<--<z-=..
Mr.. Forney writes conciliatory and earnest
appeal to the Union party to unite and not