Audubon Republican. [volume] (Audubon, Iowa) 1894-1925, 1896-06-04

rades whom duty's call found ever ready.
| Flowers shed their fragrance, and we place
them on the graves OF the departed braves,
| IMPLYING tho Immortality OF souls gone before
I am convinced. that the true way TO honor
the patriotic hosts is TO make such practical
application OF their virtues, rs to conserve the
future. The chief duty IN life Is to look ahead.
| The future Is golden, crowned with glowing
possibilities. Shall we press forward for the
key to unlock Its portals. Listen to the word
| OF God through Paul--"I count not my self to
have apprehended, but this one thing do; 1
| press toward the mark for the prize OF the high
| calling" True manhood Is the hest memorial
to patriotic service. such manhood which Is
| ''the embodiment of the ten commandments
| and the eight beatitudes" Is the most apprO-
pirate flower for decoration service. IL Is
| that character which cOnserves home and
| native land.
| Soldiers OF the Grand Army OF the Republic,
| the call Is to you again today, never ceasing.
Our country needs true manhood. Your
| country needs your trained service. Hydra
headed treason yet darts her Shiny form and
voices her 'pOisoned elOquence" IN senate
| halls. Treason still exists. Treason In the
| sale OF influence, treason In the acceptance OF
brides and transfer OF votes against the public
| good treason In the manipulation Of the ballot
box, in the intimidation at the polls, in cow
ardly silence when "wrong rules the land and
waiting justice sleeps" .. ...
These offenders should be shot with the
black ball of public wrath and execration, and
be cast into the outer darkness o social and
| political oblivion.
Men, In whose veins flows the bright hopeful
blood of youth, it shall be your high privilege
to emulate the virtues and characteristics OF
that age OF our country's distress. | recall that
when boy at school printed this motto on the
board: "Words are but leaves; deeds are the
fruits" II in our memorials we halt at these
formal tributes of the lips, they are as withered
leaves indeed. II we would bring forth fruits
we will reproduce in our lives the heroic stead
fastness OF Thomas, the determined course Of
Grant, the princly valor of Sheridan, the
heaven born enthusiasm OF Lookout mountain,
Lincoln's supreme cOnfden in the immutabe
providence Of God, and not the least Of all, That
! spirit Of devotion animating the ranks which
raised above self interest, and party interest,
! the veal Of the nation. Then shall their mantle
| justly fall on our shoulders and we shall enter,
equipped with their strength, into battles yet
to be won. Moral battles. The battle against
! the liquor power, against the dissertation OF the
! Lords Day, against social impurities, against
the many deadly isms imp anted here from
| foreign soil. The battle
"FOr the right against the wrong,
For the weak against the strong,
For the poor whO've waited long,
For the brighter age to be-"
| These needed victories must come. Come
through young Americans. Come, perhaps,
through our party If pOssibe,--yet come they
will. Men will again rise above party idolatry,
In this conflict for God, whose anglosaxon term
Is righteousness. Our liberties will then be
perpetuated, our cOuntry's honor exalted, and
that banner whose broad stripes and bright
stars have been transplanted from the irna-
ment OF heaven TO earth, shall ever unfurl I'M
sullied ia every cline. God speed the day,
when righteousness shall compass this land as
waters cover the sea.
Soldiers Of the Republic, am warned as
look into your faces, that you are OH "the
western slope OF life" Soon your.sun will set,
set In peace l trust, to rise in glory. Soon, too
soon, these services will be held In memOriam
OF vanished army. Vanquished by times
relentless army, whose commandment knows
no defeat. Even now as you call the roll of
veterans thirty thousand voices will he silent
that last year were quick with life. Three new
mounds in that beautiful city on the hill testify
your own loss, and as you call their nameS,
there will be no responses and you will say, gone
but not forgotten.
Comrades, you have suffered, bled many
have died. point you now. to another, the
silent Sufferer of Galilee. blessed be His
name.)
A grateful people, with songs of praise sing,
soldiers brave and true, and with loving hands
crown your brow with laurel wreaths. Not so
for Him. A degenerate nation, with nendish
hate cry: "Away with Him! Cruelty Him!-
While cruel hands thrust into his yielding
brow the crown Of thOrns.
The last SCENE that greets your eye will be
loving, patient forms lowering DER you, anxious
to fulfill your slightest desire, the last sound
your failing senses shall detect, will be words
Of appreciation for services rendered. To Him.
hanging between earth and sky, despised and
rejected OF men, the worlds Redeemer, dis
owned by His chosen, the last sight, men for
His garment casting lots, the sound of denials,
cursings, revilngs, moekings, scorn. His life
went out in cloud amid the commissions of
shame-faced nature, but praise God, twas re-
viyed in fioGd of light which streams down
the ages, the lfse and light of men and nations.
l come TO you today with memorial day
promise from Him. When the country no
longer needed your valued services, you were
honOrably mustered out, to enter into life
handicapped in the struggle for home which
cannot express,-yOu only know. But, Soldiers
Of the Republic, want to assure you there is no
handicap OIL the Home beyond, unless you place
1t there. This, the promise: "In my Fathers
house ARE many mansions, IL 1t were not so
would have told you; go to prepare place for
you. That where I am there ye may be also."
"And God shall wipe away all tears from their
eyes, and there shall be no more death, neither
sorrow or crying, neither shall there be any
more pain; for former things are passed away"
God forbid, that by your own volitien you may
be denied entrance there.
And when that last grand revele shall sound,
to call the ransomed home, and comes the glad
cry, Awake thou that sleepest," arise to see
the glory Of thy Lord, then the corruptible shall
put on interruption, the mortal, immortality
Your bodies shall become as the gloriied body
of the risen Redeemer, death shall be
swallowed up in victory, with Joy may You
assemble before the king in his beauty to hear
"Come we blessed Of my Father, inherit the
Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation