“I hope I am over wary; but if I am not, there is, even now, something of ill-omen, amongst us. I mean the increasing disregard for law which pervades the country; the growing disposition to substitute the wild and furious passions, in lieu of the sober judgment of Courts; and the worse than savage mobs, for the executive ministers of justice…
At the close of that [revolutionary] struggle, nearly every adult male had been a participator in some of its scenes. The consequence was, that of those scenes, in the form of a husband, a father, a son or brother, a living history was to be found in every family– a history bearing the indubitable testimonies of its own authenticity, in the limbs mangled, in the scars of wounds received, in the midst of the very scenes related– a history, too, that could be read and understood alike by all, the wise and the ignorant, the learned and the unlearned.
But those histories are gone. They can be read no more forever. They were a fortress of strength; but, what invading foeman could never do, the silent artillery of time has done; the leveling of its walls. They are gone. They were a forest of giant oaks; but the all-resistless hurricane has swept over them, and left only, here and there, a lonely trunk, despoiled of its verdure, shorn of its foliage; unshading and unshaded, to murmur in a few gentle breezes, and to combat with its mutilated limbs, a few more ruder storms, then to sink, and be no more.
They were the pillars of the temple of liberty; and now, that they have crumbled away, that temple must fall, unless we, their descendants, supply their places with other pillars, hewn from the solid quarry of sober reason. Passion has helped us; but can do so no more. It will in future be our enemy. Reason, cold, calculating, unimpassioned reason, must furnish all the materials for our future support and defence.
Let those materials be moulded into general intelligence, sound morality, and in particular, a reverence for the constitution and laws: and, that we improved to the last; that we remained free to the last; that we revered his name to the last; that, during his long sleep, we permitted no hostile foot to pass over or desecrate his resting place; shall be that which to learn the last trump shall awaken our Washington.
Upon these let the proud fabric of freedom rest, as the rock of its basis; and as truly as has been said of the only greater institution, ‘the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.'”
Abraham Lincoln, Lyceum Address, January 27, 1838
I am reminded of a conversation I had with my 7-year old grandson the other day, after the subject of Martin Luther King had entered our talk. We had been discussing the Revolutionary War, a subject of great interest to him at present.
“Did you learn about George Washington at home or at school?”
“At home.”
“Did you learn about Martin Luther King at home or at school?”
“At school.”
I asked him this in light of my observation that public school middle school kids know a lot more about Rosa Parks and MLK than they do about Washingon and Jefferson (actually they know nothing about them). Of course I do not mean to diminish the contribution of the former two, but don’t the latter two deserve some attention in the history taught to our kids?
He later corrected me when we were discussing Jackie Robinson and I referred to him as Black. I was told I should refer to him as African American. I share these things to reassure you that public school kids really are being educated and your tax dollars are not being wasted.
Admin thanks for posting that quote. What a great read. Too bad the average American would have absolutely no idea what he was talking about.
George Washington probably would have hated Abe Lincoln.
…but the founding Fathers were racists who wanted to keep blacks enslaved . Lincoln went on to free the slaves after they crossed the Pettis Bridge in Selma.
Abe talked a good game, but he was lying deceitful bastard (real father likely Abraham Enloe) who shredded the Constitution; much like the lying, deceitful, Constitution destroying probable bastard occupying the Oval Office (Barry’s likely father was Frank Marshall Davis). Lincoln didn’t like black people, he didn’t think they should vote, be jurors, and he said the white race was superior to the black race (a white supremacist). His administration and Northern army had Marxists (Forty-Eighters) in them and committed war crimes against southern civilians and soldiers. Marx and Hitler spoke highly of Lincoln, he was their kind of tyrant. John Wilkes Booth was 4 years too late, somebody should have put a bullet in his brain pan in early 1861 and over 600,000 souls might have been spared the carnage and destruction Lincoln’s war engendered. Read “The Real Lincoln” by Professor Thomas DiLorenzo and “Lincoln’s Marxists” by Al Benson/Kennedy to realize that he was the worst President ever.