The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1898-09-11

| but now from that beginning we have
run down to the other declaration that
for some men to enslave others is a
sacred right of self government
They are as opposite as God and mann
mon'
CRITICISED BY FRIENDS.
In 1858, at the close of the Republican
state convention which nominated him
for the United States senate, he deliv-
cred a speech, afterward much criti-
cised by his friends. in which his dis
cernment proved prophetic. He said:
We are now far into the fifth year
since policy was initiated with the
avowed object and confident promise
of putting an end to slavery agitation.
Under the operation of that policy that
| agitation has not only not ceased, but
has constantly augmented
In nv opinion it will not cease until
crisis shall have been reached and
passed.
"A house divided against itself can
not stand believe this government
cannot endure permanently half slave
and half free. I do not expect the
Union TO be dissolved, but 1
do expect il will cease to be divided.
1t will become all one thing or all the
other"
In defense of this speech he after
ward said: Friends. have thought
about this matter a great deal.
and am thoroughly convinced the time
has come when it should be uttered !;
and if it must be that 1 must go down
because of this speech, then let me go
down linked to truth-die in the ad-
vocacy of what is right and just. This
nation cannot live on injustice. A
house divided against itself cannot
stand say again and again"
In reply to a friend he said: You
may think that speech was mistake,
but l have never believed it was, and
you will see the day when you will
consider 1t the wisest thing l ever did"
NOT BUYING PLEDGES.
To a party who wished to be empow-
cred to negotiate reward for promises
of influence in the Chicago convention,
1860, Mr.. Lincoln replied: mo, gentle
men. have not asked the nomination,
and will not now buy ii with pledges.
II L am nominated and elected | shall
not go into the presidency as the tool
of this man or that man, or as the
property of any faction or clique"
Thus the hour of our country'S peril
was the hour when the divine power of
truth and right in a human soul was
the anchor of the ship of state. TINS
power held it firmly to the mooring of
the eternal and absolute truth which
gave the nation birth, and the storms
of disunion beat against it in vain.
Abraham Lincoln became the guar
dian OF our cOuntry's honor. and com
mander of the army and navy, when
in the shadow of threatened dissoIu-
ton, free to act as judgment and con-
science dictated. He said to the Ohio
legislature. February. 1861: 81 cannot
but know, what you all know. that
without name, perhaps without a rea-
son why L should have a name, there
has fallen upon me a task such as did
not rest upon the father of his coun-
try. And. so feeling, l cannot but turn
and look back for the support without
which it win be impossible for me to
perform that great task. i turn. then
and look to the American people, and
to that God who has never forsaken
them"
He believed. and correctly, that very
much of the i'll feeling that existed be-
tween the north and south was de
pendent upon a misunderstanding of
one another" When called upon by the
committee who notified him at his home
of his nomination he said: Gentle
men, ne must pledge our mutual health
in this most healthy beverage which
God has given us. 1t is the only bev-
erage 1 have ever used or allowed in
my family. and 1 cannot conscientious
iy depart from it on the present Occa-
sion. 1t is pure Adams ale from the
we'll"
Devotion to absolute right and love
Q. humanity linked this white-souled
man to all paople in this world and to
angels in higher realms of being He
is not sleeping under the monument
at Springfield. He is still inspiring hui
man souls with the love of liberty.
no tragedy, no epic poem will be filled
with greater wonder or be read with
deeper feeling than that which tells of
his life and death.