Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1897-05-27


whose formative history is in the same
degree embodied in a single figure,
whose eminence is due TO no accident OF
birth or power or opportunity, and still
less to any ambitious self assertion, but
solely to the fact that he was, in the
highest sense, representative Amerl-
can, whose character and ability and
unselfish devotion to country and to duty
filled out the,full measure of his respons-
| Utilities and made him he acknowledg-
ed leader of great epoch, the accepted
type of the best ideals of the American
Republic.
1t was in this capacity Not as lead
er in his own right but as a citizen sub
ject to any call his country made upon
him-that Washington always speaks of
himself in every thing he said and wrote
from the beginning to the end of the
forty-five years of his life dedicated
to its service with an upright zeal. ,"
And yet his fellow -countrymen early
recognized what impresses their descend
ants more and more, the dignity and
force of character, the extraordinary
mental balance and clear-sighted judg-
ment, the intrepid courage and single
ness of aim, that surmounted all diff
culties, survived all jealous animosities
and came unscathed through years of
storm and strife, till the evolution of
his character was complete with the ev-
olution of the young Republic, and he
was hailed by general acclaim as the
Father of his Country
Washington's long career corresponds
exactly with and distinctly typifies the
whole revolutionary period and the es-
tablishment of the government under
the Constitution. 1t began, indeed,
| with the defense of the colonial frontier
when the young volunteer showed his
capacity where the experienced soldiers
of the King had failed, and taught the
lesson of self-reliance. When the note
of resistance to the encroachments of
| the crown was sounded in Virginia,
Colonel Washington left the peaceful
pursuits in which he found delight to
| join in the patriotic councils of the col
ony and to represent it in the Cont
mental Congress, and while unwillingly
| that he went thence on his onerous mis-
sion to command the armies gathering
in defense of liberty.
| There were elder soldiers who thought
| they should have been preferred and
there We're ambitious statesmen who
never could quite accept Washington's
simple but unbending devotion to the
public cause but the instinct that had
led the Congress to it's choice of the
! young Virginian was justified more and
more by the authority of character
that could not be shaken, and through
all the clouds of doubt and despair, of
faltering and dissatisfaction and in
trigue, his great figure shines out with
brilliancy that has cast all others in
! the shade.
| At last the war ended and independ-
| ence achieved, this Cincinnatus re-
turns thankfully to his farm and his
family, only to be called again to lend
his counsel in the forma tion of more
perfect plan of government for the
young nation he had helped to bring in
to being 1t was with the same alb
sence of self as sertion that Washington
presided over the Constitutional Con
vention and gave the weight of his
charact er and judgement to its..marvel-
o usly wise achievement; and then
there came to him again his country 8
call, from which he sincerely shrank
but not the less sincerely and devoted
ly obeyed, to be its first President.
He had helped to guide the first
movement towards independence; he
had directed and sustained the war by
which independence was won, and that
as far as we can see, must have failed
without him; he had sat at the head of
those who framed the constitution, and
he was now to carry it into effect, and
to give the first impulse and direction
to the new executive power There
were other great men associated with
him and some who were to follow him.
but the more we think of all that de
pended upon the judgement and the
character of the first President and up
on the precedents he had to create, the
more Indispensable appears this one
commanding figure who proved him
self then first in peace as he was first in
war
1t is chiefly as a warrior that Wash
ington is commemorated in the monu-
ment to be dedicated to- day as
the intrepid commander of the Cont
mental armies, unfagging in courage,
fruitful of resources, quick in decision
and prompt in action. and indomitable
in patience, wrestling victory out of de
feat by the sheer force of intelligent
persistence. Washington's military
fame is greater today than a century
tago, in spite of the prodigious develop
ment in the art of war. and his place is
secure among the great soldiers of the
world. But the basis of his fame is the
same character rooted in American
soil, established in the twin conceptions
of liberty and law and inspired by the
impulses of faith and honor, of justice
and right-that asserted itself in the
Virginia Colonel and the Provincial
Deputy and that grew with occasion
till it filled the measure of highest
craftsmanship and made his heroic fig
ure at once the type of our nationality
and the centre about which our nation
al institutions crystalized, out of con-
fiict and confusion, into enduring order
the man forever first in the hearts of
| l.,