St. Johnsbury Caledonian. [volume] (St. Johnsbury, Vt.) 1867-1919, 1897-04-30
Some Rambling Thoughts.
BY "NEMo."
(Copyrighted.)

SClOOIIlOAoL IL Is 49, 81 VI
says one.
what a good idea to decorate the
graves OF the dead; it makes the burial
ground look so bright and pretty!' says
another.
What a homely old scarecrow Horace
GreeIey's statue makes; the ill-ftting
clothes and the great pudgy face, sur.
mounted by a bald head are a blotch on
Greeley Squared" says a third. And so
on, and so forth until the heart grows
weary at the large proportion of people
who gaze only at the outer aspect OF
flags, public c%eremonials and monuments.
We need more of a national imagination,
so as to look back of scenic effects and
look deeper than the surface then are
we ready to be thrilled by the real things
and the real sufferings typifed in waving
bunting or silent bronze.
Imagination blessedly broadens and
deepens life; without it the past becomes
almost silent to us. With it, the great
are our companions and great deeds our
native atmosphere. This inner sense of
appreciation transforms the plain con-
tents of a church into an arena where
souls have struggled together for an
eternal destiny. By this power the least
memory Of the city of Washington is
that of rooms and buildings; the great
est, that Of a place where mental con-
hicts, fierce and furious, have been
fought out with mental weapons, sharp
ened and serviceable where national
destinies have been made or marred by
words, light as air and heavy with fate.
We Americans ought to make it a rule
never to visit a monument without either
before or after reading up the facts of the
life portrayed before us. We shall then
quickly free ourselves from the NONSENSE
cal elements of hero worship, which
impart to the hero strangely favorable
circumstances and a condition of being
with nobler possibilities than ours; and
arrive at the conclusion that our heroes
of the battle field or OF congress, of the
pulpit or of m are men who have
been in every way tried as we are, dis
appointed often, cheered occasionally,
determined ever. This sane view Of them
will be the best view for gaining most oil
good from their careers.
Take as an example the celebration in
New York this week. General Grants
tomb is practically complete; these days
will witness its dedication and transfer.
ence to the care of the city of New York,
Thousands of soldiery and hundreds Of
thousands Of citizens will be gathered
near it for a few hours; martial music
and impassioned speeches will thrill the
hearers; and then the great crowds will
melt away, each individual returning tt
his pleasures or burdens, leaving tn,
tomb to its motionless vigil over thu
dead. Scenically the tomb is unique. II
will always be one Of the notable feature;
OF the city, raised in lorceful shape where
neither houses nor III can evel
hide it from view either by water or BY
land and unnumbered living and those
yet to live will come to it to gaze anc
pass on. Some will see in it less of gran
deur than is possessed by the m%ausoleum
Of Hadrian in Rome, after which it seems
undoubtedly to have been modelled
Others will admire its stern, square sim
plicity standing sturdily alone and
unmoved amid the restlessness OF the
tides before it and the turmoil of the city
behind it; the few will think of Grant as
a real person and see in his tomb the
spirit of the man who endured hare
duties quietly, met disappointment
quietly, enjoyed triumphs quietly. 1t
seems to me that all this pageantry and
pride is the very last thing Grant himself
would have approved; the thought OIL
being idly stared at by sight-seers would
have disquieted him.
The encouragement he gives to US ordi'
nary individuals is great at every point,
He was not a brilliant man but he was
a torceful persistent one, who just tried
to do right and if unsuccessful just tried
again. The thing that seemed a duty to
him he would follow through thick and
thin with the relentlessness of death. His
greatness consisted in doing one thing
well, and that the thing he was best
fitted to do.
1t is no derogation from his usefulness
as a model for the average lite to say
that he ceased to be really great as soon
as the rumble of battle had died down.
At that moment he rose to the zenith oil
~magnanimity when he declared, "Let
there be peace!" when he returned the
horses to the vanquished officers because
they would need them for blowing; and
when he forbade either music or signs
of exultation in the Northern army while
the arms of the Confederates were being
stacked. From that time on, he was a
very ordinary man; a poor judge OF
human nature while president; a hasty
man in connection with one or two colo.