The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1914-03-12
George Washington. the Inn
mortal American
BY REV. JAMES E. C. SAWYER, D. D.

republican ideal. The possibilities or the
development of our nation are llmltless,
and it will always be his real monument.
That it has "a boundless power OF ex-
pansion and a paradise of prosperity, be-
fore it is due to the national ideal which
he established. That ideal is organic
and vital. The republic is the incarna-
ton of the nobility of his character, his
virtue, honor and truthfulness, and his
faith in human nature as well as In God.
But however great our nation may be-
come, admiration of his moral greatness
and consequent inspiration from IL will al
WAYS transcend its limits. In his moral
grandeur he is to all nations an inspiring
ideal. His name is probably more widely
known and more universally revered than
that Of any other national hero In the
worlds history. 1t is revered by the
greatest rulers, and is ar inspiration to
semi-savage millions. When Washington
died, Napoleon Bonaparte, then the first
consul of France, announced his death to
his army, and ordered all the standards
and flags throughout the nation to be
bound with crepe for ten days; and,
what was more significant, the great
British fleet, lying off the English coast,
placed it's flags at halfmast. 10 empires
as we'll as republics Washington IS an
ideal hero. The father of his country,
he was its noblest as well as its ablest
man. He has permanently stamped
himself upon the imagination as well as
the reverence of mankind.
The moral greatness of Washington
can not be too much reverenced, but his
personal charm has received too little at
teption, he has real and vital claim
upon the human heart. His greatness
has too often been regarded as isolated
grandeur, sublime aloofress from ordl-
nary humanity. His first biographer is
mainly responsible for this. The fables
by which Weems attempted to set forth
Washington as faultless made the first
and greatest American hero appear RI
diculous. Some later biographers have
represented him as cold. unsympathetic
and devoid of humor. Many men now
middle aged or older grew up with the
belief that Washington never laughed.
| am not sure that even the boys and
girls of today realize that he was capable
of fun. and was real boy once, as fond
of the girls as he was of outdoor sports.
and not devoid of youthful faults and
boyish enthusiasm. He was real hu-
man, not a marble statue. He was ca
pable of tremendous wrath when Cir
cumstances justified it. Chief Justice
Marshall informs US that he once threw
an inkstand at an officer who had been
guilty of cowardice. At the battle of
Monmouth she swore like an angel from
heaven" 1t was when he met Gen.
Charles Lee-whom he had ordered to
lead the attack-in full retreat, a re-
treat that but for Washington would
have become rout. In his fury he
tiercely cursed Lee as a coward.
Lodge describes the scene as follows:
eat last he met Lee and the main body
in full retreat. He rode straight at Lee.
savage with anger, not pleasant to look
at, one may guess, and asked hereby
and with a deep oath, tradition says,
what it all meant. Lee was no coward.
and did not usually lack for words. He,
too, was a hardened man of the world
and, in the phrase of that day, impudent
to boot. But then and there he STAN
mered and hesitated. The fierce ques-
ton was repeated. Lee gathered him
self and tried to excuse and pall1ate what
had happened, but, although the brief
words that followed are variously re-
ported across the century, we know
that Washington rebuked him in such
way, and with such d passion, that all
was over between them. Lee had COM
mtted the one objectionable sin in the
eyes of his commander. He had failed
to fight when the enemy was upon him.
He had disobeyed orders and retreated.
1t was the end of him. He went to the
rear, thence to a court martial, thence
to dismissal and to solitary life with
ll-founded suspicion of treason hang
ing over him." Washington rallied the
broken and flying troops, got them into
line, turned them back, and checked the
advance of the enemy. What had
threatened to be fatal defeat was
transformed into victory. During the
following night General Clinton withdrew
the British forces, leaving his wounded
behind him.
He had keen and sure discernment of
men. He recognized the brilliant ability
of Hamilton when he was young and
unknown. The selection of Greene for
the leader of the Southern campaign, in
place of Gates, who had been chosen by
Congress, turned tide of disaster and
made possible the ultimate complete de-
feat of the British.
His sympathies were broad. He did
not at first understand the free and easy
ways of the New England militia. They
had been reared to an individually indie
pendent way of life and were not accus-
toned to military discipline, but before
the first year of the war was over he re-
cognized and praised their heroic quail
ties. On their part they learned to love
him. At the wars close they were the
principal part of his army. His two
dearest personal friends were Greene
and Knox. When he bade farewell to
his generals at the close of the war, he
first drew Knox to him and kissed him,
with tears in his eyes. 10 an English
visitor at Mount Vernon, in the latter
part of his life, he said of the New Eng
land people: Il esteem those people
greatly; they are the stamina OF the
Union and its greatest benefactors.
They are continually spreading them
selves, too, to Settle and. enlighten less
favored quarters. DR.. Franklin is
New Highlander.
Pre- minently Washington was Amer
lean. Before the Revolution he was not
an Englishman, but Vlrginian. He
was born seventy-six years after his
great-grandfather, John Washington,
came to Virginia, having assisted in sail
ing the ship that brought him over.
This ancestor took up land and became
an active and prominent man IN the col
ony, an officer of his county, burgess
and militia colonel, in which capacity
he had command of the Virginia troops
during the Indian war OF 1875, and won
-ooe a Grh<ar George WARhinOtOn