time but that of war would have been in clear contravention of the Constitution; and sometimes his habit of free and solitary action, even when there seemed to be no great emergency, alarmed the friends of the administration and excited the constitutional jealousy of Congress. And in any other man almost, in a selfish and ambitious man, such a habit would have been dangerous. But in him it was so balanced by transparent integrity, and unselfish, conscientious devotion to the country's good, that the people instinctively felt, whatever the opposing politicians might say, that the alarm was groundless and even ludicrous. Yet it was well, perhaps, that there were such sharp critics even among the friends of the administration, as Wade and Chandler and Winter Davis, to keep the old moorings of the Constitution and the powers and dignities of Congress in sight, that the people might easily lay hold of them again, in the event of a really dangerous man assuming arbitrary power.

Now these acts and ways of the late president are the acts and ways of a man of large original individuality and strength. Not speaking of them now either to censure or to praise, but simply as evidence of character and capacity, they denote a man of great personal power; of large native resources; of inherent ability to lead and command,—a man of independent thought and energy and will,—a man, who, though standing among strong men, impressed them more than he was impressed by them, and so showed himself stronger than they all. He impressed himself also upon events; and, though wisely accepting their teachings—indeed, by accepting their teachings-kept himself always above them, and held them in a manner within his control. He

was strong enough to disregard custom and precedent and fashion, the politic ways of more experienced statesmen, and the secret arts of diplomacy, and to walk in a path of his own appointing, -to hew out his way, indeed, as he went along. And this he did with no bluster of innovation, with no appearance of meeting antagonistic forces, but with the quiet modesty and easy self-possession and assurance of true greatness. He did it from the sheer greatness of his manhood, from the sheer strength and power of the native stuff out of which the individuality of his manhood was developed. We have not always, I know, accorded to him. this commanding ability. But history, I believe, will correct our decision: we are already correcting it ourselves.

Next, we are to inquire more particularly what were the elements of this large, commanding individuality? through what special faculties came this general efficiency?

First, as to the intellectual. Dividing the intellect into the intuitive, or philosophical, intellect; the imaginative, or poetical, intellect ; and the logical, or practical, intellect, — we should not claim for Mr. Lincoln any remarkable development of the two former divisions. In the imaginative and poetical faculties, he was deficient. He seems to have had little appreciation of the beautiful in any of its forms. He was as plain and rugged in his style of writing and thought as in his person and manners. He was entirely wanting in intellectual enthusiasm. His state papers, for the most part, though on subjects dear to his heart and of great popular interest, have been cold and practical only, and though satisfactory in substance, have awakened little popular emotion. More imagination would have enhanced his

power. It would have given him an enthusiasm, a warmth, a consciousness something like the heroic of the magnitude of events and of his own part in them, which the people have missed, and to which they would have responded with a more buoyant patriotism. It might have made him even to their consciousness the leader and hero that he actually was, so that he could have carried the country with greater ease than he did through some of the valleys of despondency and over the mountainous difficulties of the four years' struggle.

Nor should we claim for President Lincoln any remarkable development of the intuitive, or philosophical, intellect. He was no metaphysician. He seldom traced even the great principles upon which he acted back to their absolute sources or grasped them in their theoretical relations. In establishing his principles, he did not go back farther than was necessary for the practical purpose in hand. He relied more upon observation and experience than upon intuition. Compared with Mr. Seward in respect to this division of the intellect, he was inferior: yet perhaps the inferiority did not make him the worse leader for the times. pared with Jefferson in this particular, he would fall far short; with Washington, he might stand on about the same level.

Com

But his practical and logical intellect was extraordinary. He had wonderful greatness and quickness of understanding,—an immense amount of common sense. In this was concentrated the whole force of his mental nature: and here lay one of the main elements of his individual power. Seward stood far below him in this regard; and so, when it

came to affairs of practical statesmanship, the Western lawyer distanced his philosophical competitor on the first trial, though the latter had thirty years of public training behind him. In amount of practical intellect, neither Jefferson, nor Washington, nor even Franklin, was his superior. I think we have had no public man in America who, on this point, surpassed him. It was this that made him the keen and powerful logician, and the worthy antagonist, even in their own field, of greater philosophers and more experienced statesmen. It was this that gave him a style of oratory more convincing than any grace of manner or beauty of diction could have done: he had something sensible to say and he made his auditor see it to be sensible; no rhetorical art could put things in writing more strongly than his plain common sense did. It was this—this extraordinary amount of practical common sense-that gave him his knowledge of men, and his quick insight into motives and character, and his ready understanding of the ways of managing men and quietly moving great affairs. It was this that, in his high position and among men of broad culture, more than made up for any deficiency in the knowledge of books and the polish of colleges. It was this in a great measure, combined with his remarkable humor-which also belonged to the practical side of his intellect-that kept the people on such terms of cordial understanding with him, and held them to him in such close bonds of sympathy and trust. Whenever there was dissatisfaction or partial alienation, a speech or a letter came, filled with such homely, honest words of common sense, that they drew men to him in admiration of his sagacity, and silenced, if they did not

convince. His letters to the Springfield Convention, and to Governor Magoffin and Mr. A. G. Hodges of Kentucky, are specimens of argumentative political epistles hardly to be matched elsewhere. They are decisive, and make answers impossible. So also was the characteristic argument with which he pricked the bubble of Douglas's oft repeated proslavery sophistry of popular sovereignty. "My distinguished friend," said he, "says it is an insult to the emigrants of Kansas and Nebraska to suppose that they are not able to govern themselves. We must not slur over an argument of this kind because it happens to tickle the ear. It must be met and answered. I admit that the emigrant to Kansas and Nebraska is competent to govern himself, but I deny his right to govern any other person without that person's consent." His public letters and speeches are filled with similar sharp thrusts of logic; and he has left words of wisdom and wit that the world will never allow to die,- words that will give him a place in history among the first order of men honored for practical sagacity and power.

But when we turn to President Lincoln's moral nature, we find a still richer field for admiration and study. In moral qualities he stood almost without a peer among the world's great rulers and magistrates. No living statesman surpasses him in that element of personal greatness that accrues from moral strength. In this regard, he goes above Jefferson and Franklin; Washington is his only rival among our chief historic names; and in some particulars he is superior even to Washington. The equanimity of Washington was sometimes disturbed by the malicious charges and inventions of his enemies; his rare dignity and reserve gave way, and he