y were by LINCOLN on the waters of Virginia, were
defiantly repelled, the armies of the country, moving with one will,
went as the arrow to its mark, and, without a feeling of revenge,
struck a deathblow at rebellion.

Where, in the history of nations, had a Chief Magistrate possessed more
sources of consolation and joy than LINCOLN? His countrymen had shown
their love by choosing him to a second term of service. The raging war
that had divided the country had lulled, and private grief was hushed
by the grandeur of the result. The nation had its new birth of freedom,
soon to be secured forever by an amendment of the Constitution. His
persistent gentleness had conquered for him a kindlier feeling on the
part of the South. His scoffers among the grandees of Europe began to
do him honor. The laboring classes everywhere saw in his advancement
their own. All peoples sent him their benedictions. And at this moment
of the height of his fame, to which his humility and modesty added
charms, he fell by the hand of the assassin, and the only triumph
awarded him was the march to the grave.

This is no time to say that human glory is but dust and ashes; that we
mortals are no more than shadows in pursuit of shadows. How mean a
thing were man if there were not that within him which is higher than
himself; if he could not master the illusions of sense, and discern the
connexions of events by a superior light which comes from God! He so
shares the divine impulses that he has power to subject interested
passions to love of country, and personal ambition to the ennoblement
of his kind. Not in vain has LINCOLN lived, for he has helped to make
this republic an example of justice, with no caste but the caste of
humanity. The heroes who led our armies and ships into battle and fell
in the service--Lyon, McPherson, Reynolds, Sedgwick, Wadsworth, Foote,
Ward, with their compeers--did not die in vain; they and the myriads of
nameless martyrs, and he, the chief martyr, gave up their lives
willingly "that government of the people, by the people, and for the
people, shall not perish from the earth."

The assassination of LINCOLN, who was so free from malice, has, by some
mysterious influence, struck the country with solemn awe, and hushed,
instead of exciting, the passion for revenge. It seems as if the just
had died for the unjust. When I think of the friends I have lost in
this war--and every one who hears me has, like myself, lost some of
th