The Hawaiian gazette., 1889-05-21
A HAWAIIAN CONTRIBUTION TO CEN
TENNIAL LITERATURE.

|
to a large number of gentlemen
prominent in various walks of life
political, literary, educational, anC
official, inviting them to contribute
to its columns such articles as they
might consider appropriate to the
occasion. In its issue of April 18th
the Independent publishes replies
received from between forty and
fifty of the persons thus addressed
embracing prominent names on both
sides of the Atlantic. The Hawaiian
Minister at Washington writes as
follows:
HAWAIIAN LEGATION,
WASHINGTON, D. c., April 4th, 1889. !
To THE EDITOR OF THE INDEPENDENT
Your kind invitation to me to write
for The INDEPENDENT Centennial
number something on the life and
character of George Washington,
sent me to the libraries open to me,
only to find that the works one would
want to consult for such a purpose,
were already in use by the many
who are writing for the centennial
occasion; and this confirmed me III
the impression that l could not hope
to add anything which would be
novel and interesting in regard to
that great figure in American history
whose proportions grow with the
lapse of years.
Had l attempted a formal paper
its purpose would have been to show
how, few years since on coming to
America to reside, and having my
attention drawn to the papers,
personal and public accounts, etc, of
General Washington, now at the
State Department, the impression
grew upon me that no historical
character of modern times had suf-
fered so much at the hands of in
judicious eulogists as that of George
Washington.
A luminous and disembodied
figure, painted with all the aces
series of superhuman virtues, a hazy,
indefinite personality, soaring above
the reach of temptation and leading
his country to glory in the manner
of the hero of Wagnerian opera or
a spectacular drama, has been held
up to the view of the present gener-
alton, bringing despair instead Of
I,,, ND ;pcrirotiOD 70 tho vO11tb
who, finding themselves touched
with the intirmities of humanity and
not superior to its temptations, feel
the hopelessness of the great ex-
ample set before them.
This figure has hidden somewhat
from the world the truthful portrait
of the strong, virile, manly and some
what impetuous youth allied by his
occupations and associations with
aristocratic Tories, touched by the
faults of his time, yet growing with
the demands of his day steadily,
naturally, by the exercise of faculties
and virtues perfectly consonant with
a strong human nature, governed by
self-respect and a strong sense of
duty, into the great leader of the
Revolution.
To my mind the character whose
growth revealed itself in his private
papers, his accounts, and then in his
state papers, was a much more pleas
ing and helpful one than the ideal
and somewhat namby-pamby figure
drawn to cater to the popular taste
for the superhuman and incompre
hensible.
Out of this tendency there seems
to me to have come another danger,
and perhaps injustice to Washing
ton, namely, that of investing some
of his written opinions with a tesla
mentary weight, sanctity and author
ity more far-reaching and compre
hensive than he himself ever dreamed
of-giying them also literalness of
Interpretation without regard to the
spirit which inspired them, and az
plying them unfairly to changed
conditions.
1t would be as unjust to Washing
tons fame to apply his opinions be-
fore 1760, to the situation and events
of 1776 as to apply literally his ex-
pressed opinions and advice upon
the affairs OF his day, to the pro
blems of American craftsmanship of |
to-day; especially when it is attempt |
ed to show that he would have
favored an isolation in international |
affairs amounting to the self-eface
ment of a nation holding SO large a
place in the world and the worlds
affairs as the United States of the
present day.
Wasfington's whole life shows
growth and development of char
acter and appreciation of public af-
fairs and of the dignity and growth
of the United States Government;
and who can doubt but that the man
who always claimed for himself and
his country the full measure of re-
spect and consideration to which
they were entitled, would have claim
ed for the greater America of today
its proportionate measure of in
huence and dignity in the worlds
eounsels?
America think would gain much
f from the picture of Washington
here were taken away the halo and
cloudy accessories with which
mistaken zeal has invested tiff it
we're taken out of the Virgin Mary
category, and if there were allowed
o appear the figure of the strong,
earnest. high-minded gentleman,