uty, such as was laid on
the great apostle to the Gentiles to preach the Gospel, and drove
Luther to the Diet of Worms. I aim at simple truth as I speak. Such
stubbornness will surely accomplish great results and always fetch an
echo from the human breast. I abstain from overstatement. Love must
not falsify or exaggerate. It is no compliment to exalt another by
belying ourselves. Our friend belongs to history now; and the
offerings of a discriminating respect are part of its material. I must
think of him less as hewn by the Divinity than carving himself. Like
one of the straws a swallow bears to build its nest, let my poor word
go to the fashioning by many hands, of the niche of his fame. His head
had its limits; but there was no outside to his heart! The great man's
servant, secretary, keeper of his house, farmer of his estate, has
something valuable to say of him; and the humblest coeval's
contribution will not be refused or despised. Voicing the feeling of
no party, for him or against, I but touch the ground of that secret
respect to his character and aim which not only favorers but foes are
constrained, unitedly, unanimously, instinctively, to pay.

"Little heeds he what is said;
They have done with all below;"

Such were the commonplaces of the old theology founded on the notion
of a senseless rest of the dead, or their departure to an infinite
distance from our earthly abode. But we reconsider such views. He, who
was so sensitive to his fellow-citizens' regard, can hardly be
insensible now, or unconscious of our sincere honor. I would speak as
in his presence and to his ear! His clear voice will be no longer
heard in our assemblies, or his commanding form cast its welcome
shadow through our streets.

But the moral stature, with which, as in mental height, he transcended
the common sons of men, shall be seen and felt.

Nor can the recollection for ages pass how, as a brave knight, with
superb courage, horsed on ideas for the saving of the land, he flung
defiance from boldness unsurpassed at the giant wrong,--that dragon
and old serpent, the form Satan took for us, the _Barbarism of
Slavery_, and _Slavery sectional not national_, as he entitled the
greatest speeches he made. His somewhat artificial manner, method, and
phrase only clothed or cloaked an indigenous force of conscience,
which was a piece of nature, a divine monolith or monogram, if his
intellect were not. His meaning no man, white or black,