The Life Story of Abraham Lincoln -18

The Life Story of Abraham Lincoln -18

The masses of any people, however intelligent, are very little moved by
abstract principles of humanity and justice, until those
principles are interpreted for them by the stinging
commentary of some infringement upon their own rights, and
then their instincts and passions, once aroused, do indeed
derive an incalculable reinforcement of impulse and intensity
from those higher ideas, those sublime traditions, which have
no motive political force till they are allied with a sense
of immediate personal wrong or imminent peril. Then at last
the stars in their courses begin to fight against Sisera.
Had any one doubted before that the rights of human nature
are unitary, that oppression is of one hue the world over, no
matter what the color of the oppressed,--had any one failed
to see what the real essence of the contest was,--the efforts
of the advocates of slavery among ourselves to throw
discredit upon the fundamental axioms of the Declaration of
Independence and the radical doctrines of Christianity, could
not fail to sharpen his eyes. (1) A Danish antiquary and
theologian. While every day was bringing the people nearer
to the conclusion which all thinking men saw to be inevitable
from the beginning, it was wise in Mr. Lincoln to leave the
shaping of his policy to events. In this country, where the
rough and ready understanding of the people is sure at last
to be the controlling power, a profound common-sense is the
best genius for statesmanship. Hitherto the wisdom of the
President's measures has been justified by the fact that they
have always resulted in more firmly uniting public opinion.
One of the things particularly admirable in the public
utterances of President Lincoln is a certain tone of familiar
dignity, which, while it is perhaps the most difficult
attainment of mere style, is also no doubtful indication of
personal character. There must be something essentially
noble in an elective ruler who can descend to the level of
confidential ease without losing respect, something very
manly in one who can break through the etiquette of his
conventional rank and trust himself to the reason and
intelligence of those who have elected him. No higher
compliment was ever paid to a nation than the simple
confidence, the fireside plainness, with which Mr. Lincoln
always addresses himself to the reason of the American
people. This was, indeed, a true democrat, who grounded
himself on the assumption that a democracy can think. "Come,
let us reason together about this matter," has been the tone
of all his addresses to the people; and accordingly we have
never had a chief magistrate who so won to himself the love
and at the same time the judgment of his countrymen.