Salt Lake evening Democrat. [volume] (Salt Lake City, Utah) 1885-1887, 1886-09-28
PASSING AWAY.

sands now in the political arena, sur
charged with malice and all uncharita-
bleness toward the Democ ratio party and
its leaders, and primed to do any act
short of statutory crime to compass their
defeat, how touching and elevating are
the following words spoken by that
grand old Democrat Allen G. Thurman,
of Ohio, week ago yesterday to public
gathering in that State:
81 am fast travelling down the shady side,
! and will soon be numbered among the past.
But when am dead and gone, my friends,
when am laid away in my resting place, if
any of you should ever stumble over my
grave hope that you may stop and think
| that there lies man who was always a
Democrat, and whose every desire and hope
were for Democratic success. My public
record, think, will bear me out in that; and
L know this that when my last sun sets
will see it through Democratic eyes,"
1t has that undeniable ring of manhood
and consistency that has ever distin-
guished the apostles of Democracy, and
like the fnal letter from Samuel J. Til
den, is redolent of that grand spirit which
puts self aside, and sacrifices all for the
good of lifelong faith. The following
beautiful tribute from the New York Sun
is one of the grandest literary chaplets
ever bestowed on an American citizen:
Mr.. Thurman will see his last sun set with
Democratic eyes, just as he has seen it with
Democratic eyes all his life. His mind, that
which looks through the eyes, is the mind
of Democrat, powerful, elevated, sincere,
unselfsh, indefatigable in its duty in the
world of politics, and regarding the great
turmoil of Democracy with a sympathy and
satisfaction denied to the petty and preten-
tious, but which marks the true patriot, the
man who loves and believes in his fellow
men. Mr.. Thurman was not reared in an
atmosphere of Mumwumpry and humbug,
but has breathed the breath of Democracy
from his first day and will to the last. All
honor to him.
The particular and important fact es-
tablished by Senator Thurman's sad
words, is that all about us the class of
grand men of whom he was the peer, is
slowly contracting its membership,
through death, and having left their
footprints on the sands of Time" remind
those who linger on behind them that.
they can make their lives the counter
parts of the grand men who have gone
before. Senator Thurman was born and
bred in an atmosphere of honorable
political methods, and his words are
tinged with a regret that he cannot feel
safe for his lifelong worshipped theory
OF Democratic government, knowing, as
he does, the matchless trickery, mean
ness and deceit of the Republican party,
whose greatest men are but of mushroom |
growth and whose faith is but whirligig |
of the times, trained to catch the popular |
breeze at the expense of the good of the
people of the nation. Senator Thurman
and the great men of whom he is, in his
tory, part, never learned to deceive the
popular mind by the aid of specious rea-
soning, but rather led lives of honest
candor, such as comes from the
Christian teachings of devout mothers,
and leads the children when they shall
have entered the world OF craftsmanship,
9Th applause of listening senates to COM
mand,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
10 scatter plenty DER smiling land
And read their history in a nations eyes,
knowing by sad experience, the. fierce
fires of hatred, malice and misrepresenta-
ion through which Democracy must
pass to a successful issue, with his heart
md hand stilled in death, he feels the
ull import of the beautiful verse:
For who, to dumb Forgetfulness prev,
This pleasing, anxious being e'er resigned,
left the warm precincts of the cheerful day, l
nor cast one longing, lingering look be-
hindu" ]
There is cheerful outlook, however, 6
Or the future of the party, made so by 7
he hundreds of young and giant intel !
ects springing up all around us. and 7
rained in the political faith of their r
lthers, and even though the contest be
n unequal one, Truth and Right will
revail, and generations OF Democrats
ct to be born will lay flower on Thur
lan's tomb, emblematical of love for the
ian who taught them by his pure life
ow to best succeed in political life.