The daily morning journal and courier., 1906-02-12

higher law Make no contracts that will bind me-" His managers suppress l ed the last sentence, which Lincoln had underscored. They did not know what 1 manner of man he was that would not ] be bound. We in the east did not ! know him. We'll do I remember my first great political disappointment as 1 a mere youth, myself the son of free { soilar, when Seward, whose speech on ! the "Irrepressible Conflict" seemed the , bugle call to which we should march, was defeated, and Lincoln was nom mated. Wendell Phillips, with his bit ter, biting tongue, asked, 'Who Is this huckster in politics? Who is this coun- i ty-court advocate? We did not know; i God knew this huckster in politics, ] who should make of party-politics an heroic epic God knew this county- court advocate who should save the constitution, and give anew to the peo- pie the law of it's liberty.
 l There were dark days afterward when many doubted whether Lincoln was called to right the wrong of slay- cry. Voices of detraetion reached him; many noble but impatient statesmen clamored against his mighty patience. | They knew not how Lincoln, as ever in his great Taskmasters eye, bent to the single task of saving the Union given him to do, while God himself was right ing the century's wrong. The people knew him, and before he died the world had begun to know him. These lines in which Punch made retrTction of English sentiment answer for all who at first had mistaken him; Besides his corpse that bears for
 winding -shset,
 The Stars and Stripes he lived to rear
 anew,
 Between th8 mourners at his head and feet,
 Say, scurrile jester, is there room for
 you?
 Yes, he had lived to shame me from
 my sneer
 To lame my pencil and confute my
 pen;
 To make me own this hind of princes
 peer,
 This rail-splitter true born king of
 men"
 History knows him henceforth-lhe central heroic figure in q heroic ag," the first American"
 Let me single four great prophetic . | -f,1 ,t1,,h of bo vt atI enough of his own words to show how these characters were met in him.
 We see in him, first, his searching perception of the right at the heart of every issue; secdonly, his absolute com- initial of himself to the right as he saw it; thirdly, his sure faith in the moral order of the world four,hly his supreme responsibility under Almighty God. And growing out of these char acters, which were the fiber and deeply rooted strength of his manhood, as their fruit never failing, were such qualities as these: His clear common sense, his singular patience, his uncon- scious courage, his commanding leaeer- ship of the people.
 The following words, which were ut tered in 1854, show how clearly at the beginning of his career he grasped the essential principle of the anti-slavery conflict, and which he held firmly to the end:
 The plain, unmlstakable spirit of the fathers of the republic towards slavery was hostility to the principle, and tol eration only by necessity. Near eight! years ago we began by declaring ttla all men are created equal but now from that beginning, we have run dowr to the declaration that for some men t. enslave others is a sacred right of self government These principles canno stand together. They are as opposit as God and mammon; and whoeve holds to the one must despise the other October, 1S54)
 Observe the sureness of his percep tion, feel the solemn precedence of hi words as his great argument continues
 Argue as you will, and as long a you will, this Is the naked front anC aspect of the measure; and in this as pect 1t could not but produce agitation Slavery is founded in the selhshness O mans nature; opposition to it in hi love of justice, These principles arr in eternal antagonism, and whel brought into collision, so fiercely a slavery extension brings them, shocks throes and convulsions must cease1essl, follow; repeal the Missouri compro mise; repeal all compromise; repeal tn Declaration of Independence; repeal al past ttstory-you still cannot repea human nature. II still will be the abun dance of mans heart that slayer, extension is wrong; and, out of tn abundance of his heart, his mouth vii continue to speak"
 Observe another character of the mai his absolute committal of himself l. the right, as you listen to these words which he addressed to some old whig who hestated for fear that they migh be thrown into company with the aboli tionists; Stand with anybody tha stands right. Stand with him while h is in the right, and part with him wher he goes wrong. To desert such grount because of any company is to be les than a whig-less than a man-Ies than an American" Lincoln "Thot shouldst be living with us now" Woul, that abov'9 all our party politics W might bear again that voice, 'Stant !