Deseret evening news. [volume] (Great Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1867-1920, 1907-02-11
GREAT AMERICAN"
THEME OF SERMONS
Life and Ideals of Abraham Lin
coin Touched on in Salt
Lake Churches.
INFLUENCE ON THE NATION,
1t Was Declared TO be More Potent
Than That of Any Citizen Since
The Counry's Founding.

Tomorrow will be the birthday OF
Abraham Lincoln and yesterday the
life OF the great American was the sub
ject of many sermons in Salt Lake
churches. with many hundreds of
other sermons preached in all corners
OF America on the same Sunday, they
seem to point to a time when Lincoln
day shall become a national holiday
ranking with the birthday of the other
great American who first started the
nation on its journey.
In Salt Lake yesterday Rev. Frank
Fay Eddy in the First Unitarian
church, referred to Lincoln as a man
who easily lowered above his age, and
Rev. Peter A. Simpkin in Philips Con-
gregational church declared that Lin
coins life was an ideal American pat
tern.
RELIGION OF LINCOLN.
The subject of Rev. Mr.. Eddy's SER
mon was THE Religion of Lincoln"
He held that 20 measure his beliefs
with the conventional standards of re-
ligion would be the least profitable
means of discussion, as there We're no
standards OF religion 10 which he could
subscribe.
He discerned great plan of God
unfolding" said the speaker. He real
lied that as one who saw he had "A
great part to play. That commission
he accepted, And in becoming the SER
want of all he lost himself, sacrificed
himself, but only in the deeper sense of
realizing himself. If he was a fatalist,
as some say, it was because of his
strong sense of an overriding provi-
dence. whose instrument he was. Given
man with his rare intellectual dis
cernment and his poetic sympathy. and
"A absorbing
of service such as Lincoln cherished.
and the fruitage of righteousness is
certain. Witness the kindness and toll
erance which characterized him with
all of his indomltable resolutions the
tenderness and patience which blended
with the workings of an intellect re-
morselessly logical.
This was real religion, and like all
genuine religion had Its origin in life.
Religion always arises out of motives
lodged deep in our hearts. 1t can come
no other way, Belief or non-belief of IT.
self will never make a man either re-
llgious or irreligious. Religion is some-
thing as Intimately connected with a
man as the perfume with the flower or
the tide of life in the living oak. In
fact 1t is life itself and its fruit is
righteousness"
AT PHILIPS CONGREGATIONAL
Rev. Peter 4. Slmpkin treated Lin
coin from the viewpoint OF his service
In pointing the standards of ideal
American life. His text was from
Acts And God did send ruler and a
deliverer."
las we think OF the rude figure of
the backwoodsman," said the speaker,
born in perjury, nurtured by the from
tier hardships to whom the school was
only suggestion of rich possibility,
social culture only "A far-off dream,
hewing his way through the barrier OF
adverse things to stand in the blaze OF
the worlds full light and glory, II is
difficult to be moderate of estimate.
This man climbed from the COM
monplaee to stand for the age among
the unfading geniuses who stand far
above the dead level on which the teem-
Ing millions of the earth have walked,
zone is almost compelled to Weld
him undisputed place as the ideal
American. II IS not that his sole com
petltor for premiership IN the hal of
national glory-the immortal Washing
ton, is to be mInimized. II is not that
the heroic leadership the military
genius or the craftsmanship OF him
whom men hail as THE Father of his
Country" arc TO be counted the less
as the years carry us to a truer focus
Of the century past.
1T was tremendous task to cradle
the Infant freedom in an established