The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1902-05-15
THE DAY AND THE OCCASION.

FourScore and seven years ago our faith
ers brought forth on this continent a new
Nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated
10 the proposition that all men are created
equal. Now we are engaged in a great
civil war, testing whether that Nation, or
any nation so conceived and so dedicated,
can long endure. We are met on a great
battlefield of that war. We have come to
dedicate a portion of that field as a final
resting place for those who gave their lives
that that Nation might live. 1t is alto
gether fitting and proper that we should do
this. But, in a larger sense, we cannot
dedicate-we cannot conservative can
not hallow-this ground. The brave men,
living and dead, who struggled here, have
consecrated it far above our poor power
TO add or detract. The world will little
note, nor long remember. what we say
here, but IL can never forget what they
did here. 1t is for us the living, rather,
to be dedicated here to the unfinished work
which they who fought here have thus far
so nobly advanced. 1t is, rather, for us
TO be here dedicated to the great task re-
naming before us-that from these honored
dead we take increased devotion to that
cause for which they gave the last full
measure of de~votiOn-that We here highly
resolve that these dead shall not have died
in vain-that this Nation, under God,
shall nave a new birth of freedom,
and that government of the people. by the
people, for the people, shall not perish from
the earth.
These immortal words, spoken by Abra-
ham Lincoln at the dedication Of the Ma
tional Soldiers Cemetery at Gettysburg.
Nov. 19, 1863, express the very essence of
the great struggle then going on. They do
not. in every sense, fit the occasion of the
dedication of a monument in honor Of liv-
ing, as well as of dead, soldiers and sailors,
but they express the spirit of one occasion
as aptly and beautifully as they did that
of the other. When he spoke the words
which are now classic wherever the Eng
lish language is read Mr.. Lincoln had in
mind the services of soldiers who were
still living and fighting, as well as those
who had fought and died, and ever above
the dead and living soldiers he had in mind
the cause for which they had given or were
still Offering their lives. Thus, in a broad
monument to dead soldiers and living vet
Grams, as well as they did that of a ma
tiona burial ground. In one case the Ma
ton consecrated a final resting place for
those who had died in it's defense. ire
spective OF State lines, while in the other a
grateful State dedicates the finest monu-
ment of the kind in the world to its own
sons who fought in the war for the Union.
The monument will not outlive the immor-
tai words of Lincoln. but while it stands
it will express to coming generations, in the
name of Indiana, the same exalted emo
tons regarding the services and sacrifices
of her silent victors. The end crowns the
work. The monument was long in build
ing, but happily many thousands of Indi-
ana veterans still live to see the COM
pleted work and to realize that the senti-
ment of state pride in their services dur
ing the great war will be as enduring as
the magnificent memorial that typifes it.