Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-05-30

lar size since the close of the Napoieonic
struggles; loss which in certain regi-
ments was from three-fourths to four ffths
of the men engaged. Every spot on this
field has its own associations of soldieriy
duty nobly done, of supreme seif-sacrince
freely rendered The names OF the CHIEFS
who served in the two armies form long
honor roll: and the enlisted men were
worthy. and even more than worthy. OF
those who led them. Every acre OF TINS
ground has its own associations.
We see where the fight Numbered through
and around the village OF Gettysburg;
where the artillery formed on the ridges:
where the cavalry fought; where the NILS
were attacked ard defended; and where.
finally, the great charge surged up the
slope only to break on the summit in the
bloody spray of gallant failure.
What the Soldiers Have Left.
But the soldiers who won at Gettysburg,
the soldiers who fought to finish the
civil war and thereby made their country
emen forever their debtors. have left us far
more even than the memories of the war
itself.
They fought for four years in order that on
this continent those who came after them.
their children and their childrens children
might enjoy a lasting peace. They took
farms not to destroy, but to save liberty;
mot to overthrow. but to establish the SUI
spremacy of the law. The crisis which they
faced was to determine whether or not this
people was fit for self-government and Their
fore fit for liberty. Freedom is not gift
which can be enjoyed save by those who
show themselves worthy OF 1t. In this
world no privilege can be permanently APP
lpropriated by men who have not the power
land the will successfully to assume the re-
sponslbity of using 1t Alright. In his recent
admirable little volume on freedom and re-
sponSibiity in democratic government
President Hadley of Yale has pointed out
that the freedom which is worth anything
Is the freedom which means self-goy-
Freedom thus conceived Is a constructive
force. which enables an intelligent and
good man to do better things than he
could do without IT. which is in its essence
the substitution of self-restraint for exter-
nal restraint-the substitution of a form
of restraint which promotes progress for
the form which retards it. This Is the
right view of freedom but 1t can only be
taken if there is a full recognition of the
close connection between liberty and re-
sponsibility in every domain of human
thought 1t was essentially the view taken
by Abraham Lincoln. and by all those who,
when the civil war broke out. realized that
in a self-gOverning democracy those who
desire to be considered fit to enjoy liberty
must show that they know how to use IT
with moderation and justice in peace, and
how to fight for it when it is jeoparded by
malice domestic or foreign levy.
Lessons Applicable Today.
The lessons they taught us are lessons as
applicable in our everyday lives now as IN
the rare times of great stress. The men
who made this field forever memorable did
so because they combined the power OF
fealty to a lofty ideal with the power of
showing that fealty in hard, practical, COM
, nonsense fashion. They stood for the life
of effort, not the life of ease. They had
that love of country, that love OF justice,
that love of their fellow-men, without
which power and resourceful efficiency but
make a man a danger to his fellows. Yet.
in addition thereto, they likewise possessed
the power and the efficiency; for otherwise
their high purpose would have been barren
of result.
They knew each how to act for himself
and yet each how to act with his fellows.
They learned. all the generation of the
civil war learned, that rare indeed is the
chance to do anything worth doing by one
sudden and violent effort. The men who
Believed that the civil war would be ended
in ninety days. the men who cried loudest
ION to Richmond" if they had the right
stuff in them speedily learned their error;
and the was actually won by those
who settled themselves SteadfaStly down to
fight for three years, or for as much longer
as the war might last, and who gradually
grew to understand that the triumph would
come, not by a single brilliant victory, but
by a hundred painful and tedious cam
paigns. In the east and west the columns
advanced and recoiled, SWayed from side
to side, and again advanced; along the
coasts the black ships stood endlessly off
and on before the hostile forts: generals
and admlrals emerged into the light each
to face his crowded hour of success or fail
ure; the men in front fought; the men be-
hind supplied and pushed forward those in
'front.' and the final victory was due to the
deeds of all who played their parts well
and manfully, In the scores of battles. in
the countless skirmshes, in march, in
c. mp or In reserve, as commissioned off,
GERS or in the ranks-wherever and when
ever duty called them. Just so 1t must be
for US in civil life. We can make and keep
this country worthy of the men who gave
their lives to save it only on condition that
the average man among us on the whole
does his duty bravely. Loyalty and with
common sense, in whatever position life
allots to him.
Exactly as in time Of war courage is the
cardinal virtue of the soldier. so in time of
rpeace honesty, using the word in its deep
est and broadcast significance. is the essen
tiai basic virtue without which all else
avails nothing
National greatness Is of slow growth IT
cannot he forced and yet be stable and en-
during; for it is based fundamentally upon
national character. and national character
Is stamped deep in people by the lives of
many generations. The men who went
into the army had to submit TO discipline
had to submit to restraint through the gov
eminent of the leaders they had chosen,
as the price of winning. So we, the peo-
pie, can preserve our liberty and our great
ness in time of peace only by ourselves ex-
ercising the virtues of honesty of self-re-
straint and of fair dealing between man
and man. In all the ages of the past men
have seen countries lose their liberty be-
cause their people could not restrain and
order themselves, and therefore forfeited
the right to what they We're unable to use
with wisdom.
Why We Hold Them in Honor.
1t was because you men of the civil war
both knew how to use liberty temporarily
and how to defend il at need that we and
our children and our ChiIdrens children shall
hold you in honor forever. Here, on Me-
mortal day, on this great battlefield, we
commemorate not only the chiefs who ac-
tualiy won this battle; not only Meade. and
his ieutenants. Hancock and Reynolds and
Howard and Sickles, and the many others
whose names flame in our annals; but also
the chiefs who had made the Army of the
Potomac what it was. and those who after
ward led 1t In the campaigns which were
crowned at AppomattaX; and furthermore
those who made and used it's sister armies:
Mcclellan. with his extraordinary genius
for organization: Rosecrans; Buell.; Thomas,
the unyielding. the steadfast; and that
great trio, Sherman. Sheridan. and last and
greatest of all, Grant himself, the silent
soldier whose hammer-like blows finally
beat down even the prOWeSS O the men