The Penn's Grove record., 1922-02-10

of the American people, the birth
place of Abraham Lincoln, as a glIt
from the Lincoln Farm Association,
Woodrow Wilson, then President,
spoke in part as follows:
How eloquent this little house with
in this shrine is of the vigOr of dem
~ocracy! There is nowhere in the land
any home so remote, so humble, that
it may not contain the power OF mind
and heart and conscience to which ma
lions yield and history submits its
processes. Nature pays no tribute to
aristocracy, subscribes to no creeds of
caste, renders fealty to no monarch
or master Of any name or kind.
Genius is no snob. 1t does not run
after titles OF seek by preference the
high circles of society. 1t effects
humble company as well as great. 1t
pays no special tribute to universities
or learned societies or conventional
standards of greatness, but serenely
chooses its own comrades, its own
haunts, its own cradle even, and its
own life of adventure and Of training.
Here is proof of it. This little hut
was the cradle of one of the great sons
of men, a man Of singular, delightful,
vital genius who presently emerged
upon the great stage of the nations
history, gaunt, shy, ungainly, but
dominant and majestic, a natural ruler
of men, himself inevitably the central
figure of the great plot.
No man can explain this, but every
man can see how it demonstrates the
vigor of democracy, where every door
is open, in every hamlet and country
side, in city and wilderness alike, for
the ruler to emerge when he VIII and
claim his leadership in the free life.
Such are the authentic proofs of the
validity and vitality of democracy.
Here, no less, lies the mystery Of
democracy. Who shall guess this
secret of nature and providence and a
free polity? Whatever the vigor and
vitality of the stock from which he
sprang, its mere vigor and soundness
do not explain where thia mar got his
great heart that seemed to cOmpre-
bend all mankind in its catholic and
benignant sympathy, the mind that
sat enthroned behind those brOoding,
melancholy eyes, whose vision swept
many a horizon which those about
him dreamed not of-that mind that
comprehended what it had neve seen,
and understood the language of affairs
with the ready ease of n to the
n born-or that nature which
seemed in its varied richness to be the
familiar of men of every way of life.
This is the sacred mystery of democ-
racy, that it's richest fruits spring up
out of soils which no man has pre-
pared and in it's circumstances amid
which they are the least expected. This
is a place alike of mystery and Of re-
assurance.
1t is likely that in a society order
ed otherwise, our own Lincoln could
have found himself or the path of
fame and power upon which he walk
eG ~serenely to his death. In this
place it is right that we should remind
ourselves of the solid and striking
facts upon which our faith in democ-
racy is founded. Many another man
besides Lincoln has served the nation
in its highest places of counsel and of
action whose origin was as humble as
his. Though the greatest example of
the universal energy, richness, stimu-
lation, and force Of democracy, he is
only one example among many. The
%permeating and all-pervasive virtue
of the freedom which challenges us
in America to make the most of every
gift and power we possess, every
page of our history serves to empha-
size and illustrate. Standing here in
this place, it seems almost the whole
of the stirring story.
Lincoln, like the rest of us, was put
through the discipline of the world
a very rough and exacting discipline
for him, an indispensable discipline
for every man who would know what
he is about in the midst of the worlds
affairs; but his spirit got only its
schooling there. 1t did not derive its
character or its vision from the eXpe-
riences which brought it to its full
revelation. The test of every Ameri-
can must always be, not where he is,
but what he is. That, also, is of the
essence of democracy, and it is the
moral of which this place is most
gravely expressive.
We would like to think Of men like
Lincoln and Washington as typical
Americans, but no man can be typical
who is so unusual as these great men
were. 1t was typical of American
life that it should produce such men
with supreme indifference as to the
manner in which it produced them,
and so readily here in this hut as
amidst the little circle of cultivated
gentlemen to whom Virginia owed so
much in leadership and example. And
Lincoln and Washington were typical
Americans in the use they made of
their genius. But there will be few
such men at best, and we will not
look into the mystery of how and
why they come. We will only keep
E