Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1874-05-14

| the pages winch shall truthfully chronicle the
| character and consequences of the conflicts into
| which slavery and tugitive-slave laws hurled
! the nation almost from the hour Of this
! lameptatlon over repose And the Young Sen
! ator from Massachusetts, had no occasion IN
| wait for opportunity. He was summoned 10
! the very front of the conflict, aud, without
! hesitation or delay. took the position which
conviction OF duty as well as public exigency
assigned him. If therefore, it had been
! permitted to Mr.. Sumner, standing at the
goal and looking back along the years of his
labor, with all that increased knowledge
and wider experience, that wealth of Phi.
lanthropy and expansion of heart which
crowned his last days-had it then been per.
m1tted him to choose, could he have selected
a moment more tit or crowded with grander
opportunities for the enlistment of his vast
and varied powers than the one which called
INN to his work? Hardly had he entered upon
IL before he received upon his Cwn person the
concentrated malignity of that barbarous sys-
TEN OF society with which he grappled, in
blows the effect of which never left him, but
which, falling TO silence, consecrated him to
the sublime mission he SO grandly filled.
That work thus begun had many phases and
led him along many ways which sometimes
for the moment seemed devious, and which
Outlines compelled him to invoke instrument
talities pronounced doubtful by the bystauder
But all the while it grew upon his hands-it
broadened and it deepened-towerinS above
and dwarting all other work which fell to the
lot OF other statesmen. Grand in its very
simplicity, sublime in its very comprehensive
ness, it enlisted the noblest aspirations of the
statesman and lifted his whole being into an
atmosphere and life and yigor all its own
Absolute human equality secured, assured
and invunerable was the work to which with
baptism of blood and suffering he conse-
Grated all his powers. all his life and all his
homes I'm at nrly h. al
Around about it, us a CENTER all the attributes
OF his mind aud elements of his character
called INTO active service and put TO constant
task, were developed till, like the one muscle
of the blacksmith's right arm, they attained a
growth and strength unlike all others.
He was an eloquent man. But through all
his rhetoric CLEANED the battle-ax, cleaying
the chains of the slave and beating down the
hoary head of caste. His orations were not
set with diamonds nor decked with flowers
but they Numbered along the unbending track
OF logic, irresistible and crushing. They had
one purpose, the consummation of his life
work, aud he in them marshaled tl,e whole
artillery of rhetoric and of speech Tor the
assault. Learning he acquired as no utner
man in public life, but he devoted it all to this
his one great struggle; and while he levied
upon ancient lore and modern research alike
Tor Illustration, fof argument, for admonition,
and for encouragement, it was only as for so
many recruits to the forces he commanded in
a liie-campaign against human bondage. Thus
II is that his public addresses, with few eXcep-
tions, stand as monuments both of his own
power as an orator and of the transcendent
work to which his Whole life had been set
apart. Yet on those rare occasions when he
permitted himself as if in relaxation to in
dulge III current debate or in popular address
he has left ample evidence that his mind was
richly endowed with all those rare gifts
e / L
Instructed and swayed the popular mind.
Some of these orations are mastery produc.
tons, of wide spread fame.
To speak Of the work itself to which Mr..
Sumner set apart his life, and for which he
laid it down, would be to attempt not only
the history of his country from his entrance
into public life to the hour when his labors
ceased, but also that of human rights and hu.
man equality the world over. This cannot be
attempted here. Happily it is not needed to
complete the duty of the hour. That work,
once derded denounced, scoffed at and spit
upon, has now conquered all opposition and
to-day commands support well-nigh univer
sal. There remains no forum in which its
justice is debated and no home or heart so
lowly that its efficacy does not reach it. 1t
was not permitted him TO see the formal enact
ment of a civil rights bill he had so long la
bored and waited for. But he knew that this
keystone of the grand arch was already fitted
to its place. What he suffered, what he sac
rifced, what he lifted and carried to the end
of ali things on earth to him, in the hone that
his own work might be completed by his own
hand, cannot now be put in words.
/ have said that Mr.. Sumner was some
times misunderstood. | speak not now of
that common lot of public men which sub
Jects them to the Misrepresentation and de-
nuuciatons of opponents often as indiscrm-
nate as unjust. There is more trying ordeal,
when the vision of ,trieads becomes dim and
familiar faces turn away for time in doubt
and distrust Then the statesman who is
faithful to his convictions will wait patiently
and silently in the path Of duty till, the mist
lifting and the light breaking in, the blinded
see again the outline Of that pathway and hail
anew his advancing footsteps. Thus recently
his own beloved commonwealth, proud and
long trusting as she is, vet for a moment los
ing her vision in a bewildering twilight
turned her face away from Mr.. Sumner and
his work. Not a word of complaint fell from
his lips. Conscious of lofty and noble asp-
ration, and with an unfatering faith that
time would bring him vindication, he waited
patiently for the dawn of brighter day and
the opening of a clearer vision. They came at
last, but only just in time to save her, in this
her day of mourning the added pang of un-
atoned injustice
have no space to speak Of those varied ac-
complshments, that wealth of knowledge and
that kindliness Of heart which were the charm
of social life. But | desire to put on record
my deep obligations for an unbroken friend
ship Of seventeen years, begun in common
public service, and interrupted only by that
great event which has alike crushed private
friendships and social ties, and brought ire
parable loss upon the public service, the
country and mankind.
| Mr.. Summer reared his own monument and
has left it complete. 1t will stand peerless
| through all the ages that free government and
human equality shall exist on the earth. An
enslaved race, lifted to freedom, TO citizen
| ship, and to equal rights, will crown 1t with
IF frlsL I.tfArt anl Ninilri4Ls