The Ocala evening star. [volume] (Ocala, Fla.) 1895-1943, 1913-07-05

Look around you upon the field of
Gettysburg. Picture the array, the
| fierce heats and agony of battle, col
umn hurled against column, battery
believing TO battery, ValOr? Yes!
Greater no man shall see in war; and
Iself-sacrifice, and loss to the utter
most; the high reckIessness of exalted
devotion which does not count the
cost. We are made by these tragic,
epic things to know what it costs to
make a nation-the blood and sacrifice
of multitudes of unknown men lifted
to a great stature in the view of all
generations by knowing no limit to
their manly willingness to serve. In
armies thus marshaIed from the ranks
OF free men you will see, as it were,
nation embattled, the leaders and
the led, and may know if you will, how
little except in form it's action differs
in days of peace from its action in
days of war
May we break camp LOW and be at
ease? Are the forces that fight for
the nation dispersed, disbanded, gone
to their homes forgetful of the COM
mon cause? Are our forces disorgan-
| lied, without constituted leaders and
the might of men consciously united
because we contend, not with armies,
but with. principalities and powers and
wickedness in high places. Are we
mean sympathy, our peace content
ment, our vigor right action, our ma
turity self-comprehension and a clear
confidence in choosing what we shall
do? War fitted us for action, and ac-
tion never ceases.
| have been chosen the leader of
the nation. l can not justify the
choice by any qualities of my own, but
so it has come about, and here | stand.
Whom do ] command? The ghostly
hosts who fought upon these battle
fields long ago and are gone? These
gallant gentlemen stricken in years
whose fighting days are over, their
glory won? What are the orders for
them, and who rallies them? | have
in my mind another host, whom these
set free of civil strife in order that
they might work out in days of peace
and settled order the life of a great
nation. That host is the~people them
selves, the great and the small, with
out class or difference of kind or race
or origin; and undivided in interest,
| if we have but the vision to guide
and direct them and order their lives
Alright in what we do. Our constitu-
| tions are their articles of enlistment.
The orders of the day are the laws
upon our statute books. What we
strive for is their freedom, their right
to lift themselves from day to day and
behold the things they have hoped
for, and so make way for still better
days for those whom they love who
are to come after them. The recruits
are the little children crowding in.
| The quartermaster's stores are in the
mines and forests and fields, in the
shops and factories. Every day some
thing must be done to push the cam
paign forward; and it must be done
by plan and with an eye to some great
destiny.
How shall we hold such thoughts in
our hearts and not be moved? l would
not have you live even today wholly
in the past, but would wish to stand
with you in the light that streams
upon us now out of that great day
gone by Here is the nation God has
builded by our hands. What shall we
do with it? Who stands ready to act
again and always in the spirit of this
day of reunion and hope and patriotic
fervor? The day of our country's life
has but broadened into morning. Do
not put uniforms by. Put the harness
of the present on. Lift your eyes to
the great tracts of life yet to be con-
quered in the interest of righteous
peace, of that prosperity which lies
in a peoples hearts and outlasts all
wars and errors of men. Come, let US
be comrades and soldiers yet to serve
our fellow men in quiet counsel where
the blare of trumpets is neither heard
nor needed and where the things are
done which make blessed the nations
of the world in peace and righteous
mess and love.
There is more catarrh in this Sec
tion of the country than all other dis
leases nut together and until the last