Page images
PDF
EPUB
[graphic][ocr errors][subsumed]

NATIONAL LINCOLN MONUMENT AT SPRINGFIELD, ILLINOIS. Unveiled and dedicated, October 15, 1874. signed and modeled by Larkin G. Mead. Cost, $212.000. Dimensions 72% by 119% feet square, and 100 feet high. De

Emblematical of the Constitution of the United States. President Lincoln standing above the coat of arms, with the Infantry, Navy, Artillery, and Cavalry marshalled around him, wields all for holding the States together in a perpetual bond of Union, without which he could never hope to effect the great enemy of human freedom. The grand climax is indicated by President Lincoln with his left hand holding out as a golden sceptre, the Emancipation Proclamation, while in his right he holds the pen with which he had just written it. The right hand is resting on another badge of authority, the American Flag, thrown over the fasces. At the foot of the fasces lies a wreath of laurel with which to crown the President as the victor over slavery and rebellion.

[blocks in formation]

I

HAVE no capacity to do justice to the greatness, purity and honesty of Abraham Lincoln, nor to the immense value of his service to our country. The great heart of the nation alone is equal to a work of such magnitude. He touched the manacles of four millions of men and women, and in the twinkling of an eye they dropped off forever. He wrote a word, and slavery, which had hung like a mill-stone around the neck of the nation, compelling it to bow its head in shame and disgrace, sunk into oblivion. The possibilities of his life were grand; how grandly were they realized! The glory and luster of his name will stand in the history of the nation "more lasting than a monument of brass."

LEWISTON, 1882.

друг

LETTER TO JAMES C. CONKLING,

AUGUST, 1863.

THE signs look better. The Father of Waters again goes unvexed to the sea. Thanks to the great Northwest

On

for it; not yet wholly to them. Three hundred miles up they met New England, Empire, Keystone and Jersey, hewing their way right and left. The sunny South, too, in more colors than one, also lent a helping hand. the spot, their part of the history was jotted down in black and white. The job was a great national one, and let none be slighted who bore an honorable part in it. And while those who have cleared the great river may well be proud, even that is not all. It is hard to say that anything has been more bravely and well done than at Antietam, Murfreesboro, Gettysburg, and on many fields of less note. Nor must Uncle Sam's wet feet be forgotten. At all the watery margins they have been present. Not only on the deep sea, the broad bay, and the rapid river, but also up the narrow, muddy bayou, and wherever the ground was a little damp, they have been and made their tracks. Thanks to all. For the great republic-for the principle it lives by and keeps alivefor man's vast future-thanks to all. Peace does not appear so distant as it did. I hope it will come soon and come to stay; and so come as to be worth the keeping in all future time. It will then have been proved that among freemen there can be no successful appeal from

LETTER TO JAMES C. CONKLING.

295

the ballot to the bullet, and that they who take such appeal are sure to lose their case and pay the cost. And there will be some black men who can remember that with silent tongue, and clinched teeth, and steady eye, and well-poised bayonets, they have helped mankind on to this great consummation, while I fear there will be some white ones unable to forget that with malignant heart and deceitful speech they have striven to hinder it. Still, let us not be over-sanguine of a speedy, final triumph. Let us be quite sober. Let us diligently apply the means, never doubting that a just God, in his own good time, will give us the rightful result.

Alsa ham Lincoln

REPLY TO THE LETTER OF GOVERNOR SEYMOUR, OF NEW YORK,

AUGUST, 1863.

No time is wasted, no argument is used. This produces an army which will soon turn upon our now victorious soldiers in the field, if they shall not be sustained by recruits as they should be. It produces an army with a rapidity not to be matched on our side, if we first waste time to re-experiment with the volunteer system, already deemed by Congress, and palpably, in fact, so far exhausted as to be inadequate, and then more time to obtain a court decision as to whether a law is constitutional which requires a part of those not now in the service to go to the aid of those who are already in it; and still more time to determine with absolute certainty that we get those who are to go in the precisely legal proportion to those who are not to go. My purpose is to be in my action just and constitutional, and yet practical in performing the important duty with which I am charged, of maintaining the unity and free principles of our common country.

Abraham Lincoln

« PreviousContinue »