The Lancaster gazette. [volume] (Lancaster, Ohio) 1863-1886, 1866-03-22

DISTRICT ATTORNEY FOR THE STATE.
Mr.. PRESIDENT, LADIES AND GENTLE
MEN: Eoents fraught with great bless
iDgs TO the people, are cherished and
memorized throughout the civilized
world but of all the great men whose
deeds have passed into history and
whose names now adorn its pages
but few have received a nations hom.
age, manifested in spontaneous and
universal celebration Of their BIRTH
Washington and Lincoln furnish the
exceptions in America. As to them.
the distinction is as marked as the tri.
butte is merited.
These celebrations are not vain and
useless, but proper and fruitful of good
They encourage emulation, inspire
hope, stimulate virtue, and renew pa.
triotism. They prompt and quicken
generous impulses, strengthen resolu-
tion, expand sympathy, make us wiser
and better men. In mounting the sum-
nit the great men we honor left foot
prints behind. These, If we follow,
will lead us in safety TO the goal.
When the event we have met to com
memorate transpired, it was thought
TO be Of but little moment. No herald
proclaimed its advent. The mountains
OF Kentucky c-echoed the salute of no
cannon. No pomp or pageantry evinc-
ed a nations Joy, or testified peoples
gratitude. No "star marked the birth.
place" Of Lincoln. The little family,
"the oaks that stretch their arms to the
skies and wrestle with the storms" !"
God and the angels, were the only wit
nessess Of his coming.
Not the time, or place, of his birth =;
not wealth, or rank, or title; not the
incidents of his boyhood, youth or ear
ly manhood but his sterling virtues,
bis sublime humility, his unsullied pu.
rlty of character, his fidelity and pat
riotism to the country-his deep devo.
ton to human progress and liberty
his earnest sympathy with the people,
his intimate association, as the master
spirit and principal actor, with the
grandest events and most perilous hour
of time or history, have given Abra-
ham Lincoln pre-. eminence-made him
the idol of America-won for him the
love, gratitude end admiration of the
present and coming time made him to
other men as the Alps TO other noun.
tains-unrivalled in the grandeur of his
intellectual proportions and unap.
preached in the splendor Of his moral
sublimity and excellence.
AbrahamLncoln was born inHardin
county, Kentucky, on the 18th of Feb.
ruary, 1909. The place of his nativity
and infancy was rude log cabin, fur
nished in the coarse and meagre sim
plicity of the early backswood's life,
situated in beautiful and picturesque
spot on the then verge of Western civ
ilization. His parents were poor, hum.
BILE and almost illiterate, enjoying
none of the advantages none of the
Injuries and few of the comforts of life.
Thus was Abraham Lincoln born, Gas
he subsequently grew up) in indigence,
without an interest to further his ad-
vancemcnt-with nothing to rely upon
but a sound, moral, intellectual and
physical constitution. His infancy and
childhood were rocked in the cradle of
adversely" Nature was his instruct
ress. As Dcmosthenes drew his elo-
quence from the sea, so Lincoln drew
his lessons OF fidelity from the sun-of
constancy, from the stars-of stability,
from the mountains-ot firmness, from
the rocks. The storms were his music,
and the wild flowers his playmates. In
the midst of untamed nature his genius
was nurtured. Thence came the firm
ness and purity of his character.
Happily for Abraham Lincoln, hap
PLY for mankind; happily indeed for
the bondsmcn. Goods image carved in
ebony" now free forever, it was not the
destiny of Abraham Lincoln to remain
in Kentucky. In the providence of
God he was ordained an instrument
to accomplish an immortal work. An
atmosphere rent with the shreks of
the oppressed, and reeking with the
stencil of human slavery, degrading
labor, corrupting morals, retarding
development and blighting every gem
erous impulse-where wealth and birth
were of such great significance, and
labor so despised-must have contain
mated the soul and crushed the hopes
and aspirations Of the child Of poverty
and humility, whom necessity compel
led, side by side with the wretched
slave, to gather his subsistence in the
''sweat drops of toll" The peerless
spirit whose destiny was to play such
an eventful, such master part in the
worlds history-who was to hold in
his hands the lives, hopes and liberties
Of thirty millions of people, and who
to that great eminence was to carve his
way, up through pride and ignorance,
through the serried battlements, &C.
mented by centuries of prejudice, arro-
yance, wickedness and crime-cosld
alone be fostered developed and matur.
ID in land of free schools, honorable
and absolute equality,
where virtue was not a mockery and
liberty mere name.
The spirit of an adventure, as rest
ess as the sea, as advancing as the |
storm, as fearless of hardship and peril
rs the wind, ever characteristic of the
American pioneer; the appalling dread
If the corrupting influence of that in
which usurped the energies
md prostituted the virtues of a race,
'arly impelled Thomas Lincoln to re-
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