Daily capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1896-1899, 1898-09-27
uncoLRs GETTYSBURG SPEECH.
Sublime and Immortal. Though MstTIev
Arnold Rad Never Heard Of 1t

Sublime and Immortal Inougn mhtf ieN
Arnold Rsd Never Heard Of It
stood close by and heard that speech
delivered. lt came upon us after the
pondorous and elaborate rhetoric Of Ed
ward Everett like blaze Of real fire
after metchless picture OF FIRE. II
sprang, like the strophes Of old, out Of
h ohastened heart almost broken with
the weight Of conquest but still daunt.
less in its American faith, and the man
who spoke the words was, for the mo-
mont, transAgured for us, and his fur
rowed face and gaunt form took on
the light that never was on land OF
SEQ, SO that he became the arohetype OF
the people themselves, uttering better
than no knew the great prayer Of that
fner and better humanity that our ia
theirs and we believed was to come with
liberty aud equality out of storm and
stress and an unshaken confidence in
man.
But l don't think any Of us then
knew how masterful is tho speech Of
the human heart when It comes through
the furnace to these great occasions and
plants its sad sincerity by the side OF
mere scholarship and the grooved thun-
der of rhetoric.
! We had to live on for n quater Of n
century and see that brief speech burn
ing with unquenchable fame in ouI
schoolboolSs and standing out with mod
est majesty on our page Of recorded
history to comprehend how God ran
touch with q living coal tho lips Of q
rail splitter just as he touched the lips
of tentmaker of Tarsus and lifted the
untutored heart Of the shoemaker, Bun.
yam, into communion with the immor'
tails.
Turn 1t every way you can, tho Get.
tysburg speech stands unique rs brief
literary and patriotic composition. IL Ia
1 the noblest condensation into the fittest
words of oil the emotions, aspirations
and sentiments that millions of mute
people wanted at that moment 10 utter.
So inwrought is that speech with the
heart of the occasion, and 20 majestic.
ally does it sweep over into the time to
come, that should think all men every.
where would discern its intrinsic quail.
ty. But that is not the case.
remember talking with Matthew
Arnold when he was in this country
about Abraham Lincoln--you will re.
member that no said of Lincoln that he
had no "distinotion" called his
attention to the Gettysburg speech.
shall never forget the imperturbable
Saturday Review stare with which no
asked. "Ah, what Is the Gettysburg
spoech?"
He had never heard Of it. / believe
when no went back he asked Professor
Bryce what it was about, and when II
was hunted up in an American school
book and shown to him he read it hasti.
ly and put IL away with commiserating
reticenco
Suppose you ask NJ. Bourget, who Is
looking into the American heart by the
way of the American bodice and on
space rates, If he has read the Gottys.
burg speech. happen to know Of my
own knowledge that Robert Louis
Stevenson had not heard Of it when he
was exploring our continent, and Sir
Lepel Griffin and Rudyard Kipling had
an idea that it was newspaper fake.
The current number Of Tho Saturday
Review lies open before me, and this is
what my eye falls on;
1.-THE common American delusion
that there have been number Of great
American poets. that there is indeed
huch a thing as American literature
disports itself with unusual pomposity.
lt is impossible for these literary
prigs of a special cult to understand
that there may be stimulaut con0i.
tions Of national life that wake into
tumultuou5 activity all the higher and |
better functions Of the soul prior to the |
chartered formulation OF them into an |
art, and that 10 is in these periods Of
awakening and not in tho after repose
Of an elaborate gsthoticism the most
precious heGrtbeats of tho race have
made themselves heard and felt, some.
times III half artioulato tones, hut often.
er in organ blasts which havo set the
key Of liberty and fixed tho vocabulary
OF hope and victory.
Before eloquenoe or poetry was an art
IL was burning soul and fetched its
style from the agonies and mysteries of
an untutored nature.
Let us by all means confer distino
tion on a doathless utteranoe by mold
ing it in bronze If we add metal enough
and surround it with the arabesque Of
Oxford, future Matthew Anolds may
join tho pilgrims and throw the English
tribute Of a we'll turned phrase upon
the tablet which, after all, is but a
weak hioroglyph of the record in TO-.
600, 900 hearts Andrew O. Wheeler
In NayV York sun