The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1910-02-11


tors. Burke, Fox, Patrick Henry, Daniel
Webster have charmed thousands with
their matchless eloquence. 1t is doubt
full if any of them ever surpassed in
purity of diction and impressive de-
liverance the efforts of the self taught
man, Abraham Lincoln. We have com
piled few extracts from some of his
leading addresses, which are worthy of
perusal over and over again.
In 1897, at the beginning of his po-
litical career, he delivered an address
on "The Perpetuation of Our Free In
stitutions." in which occurred the fol-
flowing sentences:
"Theirs was the task, and nobiy they
performed it, to possess themselves and,
through themselves, us, of this goodly
land, and to rear upon it's hills and val
leys a political edifice of liberty and
equal rights; 'tis ours only to transmit
these, the former unprofaned by the
foot of an invader the latter undecayed
by the lapse of time. This, our duty
to ourselves and our posterity, and love
for our species in general, imperatively
requires us to perform.
At what point then, is the approach of
danger to be expected / answer, if it
ever reaches us, it must spring up
among ourselves. 1t cannot come from
abroad. If destruction be- our lot, we
must ourselves be its author and fin
isher. AS nation of free men we must
live through all time or die of suicide"
| In one of his notable debates with
Stephen A. Douglas he uttered these
prophetic words:
"Many countries have lost their
liberties and ours may lose hers; but
if she SHALL be it my proudest plume.
not that l was the last to desert, but
| that I never deserted her. \
The probabilities that we may fall in
the struggle ought not to deter us from
the support of cause which we deem
lust. 1t shall not deter me. IF ever I
| feel the soul within me elevate and ex-
pand to those dimensions not wholly
unworthy of it's Almighty Architect, it
Is when / contemplate the cause of
my country, deserted by all the world
besides, and I, standing up boldly and
alone, hurting defiance at her victorious
oppressors. And here, without con-
templating the consequences, before high
Heaven and in the face of the whole
world, | swear eternal fidelity to the
lust cause, as | deem it, of the land
OF my life, my liberty and my love-"
Many references have been made bv
historical writers to Lincoln's great
speech ON the occasion of the dedication
OF the national cemetery at Gettysburg.
Edward Everett was one of the most
polished and scholarly orators of his
day and had delivered an eloquent or
alton, paying splendid tribute to the
soldier dead French, the historian and
biographer comments as follows:
After the Grafton was ended Mr..
Lincoln was called upon to speak. He
had bestowed but little time and
thought upon his speech. On the cars.
while on the way to the battlefield. he
had called for a pencil and piece of
paper and had hastily written out the
few sentences which were destined to
produce so profound an impression. He
arose slowly, adjusted his spectacles
and, with his whole frame quivering
with emotion and his voice shrill and
penetrating, read the following address,
-Four score and seven years ago, our
fathers brought upon this continent
new nation, conceived in liberty and
dedicated to the proposition that all
men are created equal. Now we are en-
ragged in a great civil war. testing
whether that nation, or any nation so
conceived and so dedicated, can long
endure. We are met on great battle
fleld of that war. We are met to dedi-
cate portion of it as the final rsting
place OF those who here gave their lives
that that nation might live. It is al.
together fitting and proper that we
do this. But, in larger sense, we can
not dedicate-we cannot conservative
cannot hallow this ground. The brave
men, living and dead, who struggled
here, have consecrated it far above our
power to add or detract. The world will
little note nor long remember what we
say here, but it can never forget what
we did here. 1t is for us, the living.
rather to be dedicated here to the un
finishd work that they have thus far
so nobly carried on. It is rather for
us to be here dedicated to the great
task remaining before us. that from
these honored dead we take increased
devotion to the cause for which they
gave here the last full measure of de-
votion, that we here highly resolve that
the dead shall not have died in vain;
that the nation shall, under God, have
a new birth of freedom, and that gov
ernment of the people, by the people
and for the people shall not perish from
the EARTH"
II has been often said that Lincoln