Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1911-11-10

and oppressive Legislation. If Lincoln
had lived there would have been wanting
to the extremism fthe time the bloody
cue of his taking off to mount the
steeds and spur the flanks of vengeance.
For Lincoln entertained, with respect
| to the rehabilitation of the union,
the single wish that the southern states
Ito use his homely phraseology--
should come back home and behave
themselves" and if he had lived he
would have made this wish effectual as
he made everything effectual to which
he seriously addressed himself. Poor
insane John Wilkes Booth! Was he, too,
an instrument in the hands of God to
put a still deeper damnation upon the
taking off of the Confederacy and to
sink the southern people yet lower in
the abyss of affliction and humiliation
in the living Lincoln had spared us?
| He spoke of Lincoln's teaching and
example, and paid a glowing tribute to
President Taft as follows:
Tragedy walks hand-in-hand with His
tory and the eyes of Glory are wet
with tears-'With malice toward none
with charity for all"-since Christ said
blessed are the peace makers for they
shall be called the children OF God,y has
heart of man, stirred to its Depths by
human exigency, delivered a message
so sublime? Irresistibly the mind occurs
to that other martyr of the ages whom
not alone in the circumstances of OBJ
scure birth and tragic death. bat in
those of simple living and childlike
faith, Lincoln so closely resembfed
Yon lowly cabin which is to be official
| ly dedicated on the morrow may well
be likened to the Manager of Bethlehem,
the boy that went thence to a GodIike
destiny, to the Son of God, the Father
Almighty, of him and of us ALL For.
whence his prompting except from God?
JUST AN AMERICAN.
There are utterances of his which
read like rescripts from the Sermon on
the Mount Reviled even as the Man OF
Galilee, yet as gentle and as unoffend-
ing, a man who died for men. Roll the
stone from the grave and what shall we
see? Just an American. The Declara-
ton of Independence his confession of
faith. The constitution of the United
States his ark and covenant of liberty.
The union his -edoubt, the flag his shib-
boleth. Called like one Of old, with
in handful of years he rose at SUI
preme moment to supreme command,
fulfilled the law of his being, and passed
from the scene an exhalation of the
dawn of freedom. We may still hear his
CHEEKY voice, bidding us be of good heart,
sure that right makes might" entreating
us to pursue with firmness in the right
as God gives us to see the right"
The problems he met and solved are
problems no longer. Other, it may be
greater problems. rise before us. Shall
there arise another Lincoln?
May God grid round and guard his sue
cessor in the great Office of chief magis-
trate whom we have here with US this
day; give him the soul Of Lincoln to feel
Lincoln's wisdom to see and know; to
the end that which ever OF the parties
prevail and to whatever group OF men
are committed the powers of administra-
ton, whole-hearted devotion TO the pub
lie service and large-minded fidelity to
American institutions may continue to
glorify the teaching and example of
Abraham Lincoln.
WORDS STILL RING.
His peroration was as follows:
LET us here highly resolve the
words still ring like a trumpet-call from
that green-grown hillside of Gettysburg
dotted with the graves of heroes, that
these men shall not have died In vain;
that this nation. under God, shall hove
a new birth of freedom; and that gov
eminent of the people. by the people
and for the people shall not perish from
the earth" Repeat we the declaration.
AS we gather about this effigy in bronze
and marble in this the capitol of Ken
tucky-of Kentucky, the most world
famous among the states of America.
whose birthright carries with it a uni
versal and unchallenged badge of honor;
of Kentucky, which gave to the longest
and bloodiest of modern wars both its
chieftains, Abraham Lincoln and Jeffer-
son Davis, and to each of the contend
ing armies a quota of fighting men
larger than was contributed by any
other state singly to either army; Of
that Kentucky whose Clay, antedating
Lincoln In the arts of Cancellation and
eloquence. tried to effect and did for a
time effect by compromise what Lincoln
could only compass by the sword, and
whose Crittenden was last seriously TO
invoke the spirit of fraternity and
peace; of our own Kentucky, dark and
bloody ground of the savage, beloved
home of all that we hold generous and
valiant in man, graceful and lovely N
woman. wherein when the battle was
ended the war was over, and once a
Kentuckian always Kentuckian, the
Federal and the Confederate were BROTH
ers again-let us here, whether we cali
ourselves Democrats or Republicans, re-
new our allegiance to the constitution
of the republic and the perpetuity of
the unioni