"I mail you a very brief rÉsumÉ of my connection with Mr. Lincoln from 1854 on, up to the day he was assassinated. This will answer your query and request, I think, fully. Of course the address made at the tomb of the great, dear man, on May 26, 1904, was greatly abridged for lack of space, but many essential points you will be able to gather from what I send you. And I am glad to do this, for nearly all his biographers ignore both his prohibition and his religious work and character."

"If it be ascertained at the War Department that the President has legal authority to make an appointment such as is asked within, and Gen. Scott is of opinion it will be available for good, then let it be done.

"I esteem the mission of Mr. Merwin to this army a happy circumstance, and request all commanders to give him free access to all our camps and posts, and also to multiply occasions to enable him to address our officers and men.

"The mission of Mr. Merwin will be of great benefit to the troops, and I will furnish him with every facility to address the troops under my command. I hope the Gen'l commanding the army will give him such official position as Mr. Merwin may desire to carry out his object.

"Surgeon General will send Mr. Merwin wherever he may think the public service may require.

"We stand to-day in the heart of the continent, midway between the two oceans, within the shadow of the monument of the man who made more history—who made greater history than any other person, than all other persons who lived in the nineteenth century! A leader of the people, who was great in their greatness, who carried their burdens, who, with their help, achieved a name and a fame unparalleled in human history. He broke the shackles of four millions of slaves. He saved to the world this form of government, which gives to all our people the opportunity to walk, if they will, down the corridors of time, arm in arm with the great of all ages, sheltered and inspired by the flag which has become the symbol of hope and of freedom to all the world!

"In God's good providence, I came to know him—here in his humble home in Springfield, in 1854, and before he had come to be the hero, beloved, glorified, known and loved by all who love liberty. It was in the autumn of 1854. I was a young man full of all the enthusiasm of those first Neal Dow triumphs in New England. Accepting the invitation of friends, I came to Illinois, where the campaign for State prohibition was getting under way. I reached Springfield, and one night had the privilege of speaking in the old State House, where, with legislators and townspeople, I found an appreciative audience.

"After my address, there were calls of 'Lincoln! Lincoln! Lincoln!' and turning, I saw, perhaps, the most singular specimen of a human being rising slowly, and unfolding his long arms and his long legs, exactly like the blades of a jack-knife. His hair was uncombed, his coat sleeves were inches shorter than his shirt sleeves, his trousers did not reach to his socks. First I thought there was some plan to perpetrate a 'joke' on the meeting, but in one minute, after the first accents of the pathetic voice were heard, the crowd hushed to a stillness as profound as if Lincoln were the only person present, and then this simple, uncouth man gave to the hushed crowd such a definition of law, its design and mission, its object and power, such as few present had ever known or dreamed. Among the points he made were the following:

"Mr. Lincoln asked, 'Is not the law of self-protection the first law of nature; the first primary law of civilized society?' 'Law,' he declared, 'is for the protection, conservation, and extension of right things, of right conduct; not for the protection of evil and wrong-doing.'

"'The State must, in its legislative action, recognize in the law enacted this principle—it must make sure and secure these endeavors to establish, protect, and extend right conditions, right conduct, righteousness. These conditions will be secured and preserved, not by indifference, not by a toleration of evils, not by attempting to throw around any evil the shield of law; never by any attempt to license the evil.'

"'This sentiment of right conduct for the protection of home, of state, of church, of individuals must be taken up and embodied in legislation, and thus become a positive factor, active in the state. This is the first and most important function in the legislation of the modern state.' Proceeding, Mr. Lincoln said: 'This saves the whole, and not a part, with a high, true conservatism through the united action of all, by all, for all. The prohibition of the liquor traffic, except for medical and mechanical purposes, thus becomes the new evangel for the safety and redemption of the people from the social, political, and moral curse of the saloon, and its inevitable evil consequences of drunkenness.'

"Lincoln studied every moral and political issue in this light and from this standpoint, and, as a result of this practice, he studied the opposite side of every question in dispute, and hence he was never surprised by the seeming strength of his opponents, for he saw at once the moral and legal weakness of wrong and untenable positions assumed. This it is that throws a flood of light on his ready and unanswerable repartee by story and statement. In fact, we have seen, often, that after his statement of a proposition it needed no argument.

"Honorable Elihu B. Washburn, Lincoln's closest friend, wrote before he died that 'when the whole truth is disclosed of Mr. Lincoln's life during the years of 1854-55, it will throw a flood of new light on the character of Mr. Lincoln, and will add new luster to his greatness and his patriotism.'

"Mr. Lincoln had, as is well known, made up his mind to retire from the political arena. He was annoyed, yea, more, he was disgusted with the low plane on which the politicians, mere politicians, not statesmen, were trying to conduct the affairs of the nation.

"Mr. Lincoln was feeling his way up and out of the gloom, despondency, and melancholy which had to so great an extent affected his life. There came to him a new light, a new revelation of destiny in those still creative, or rather recreative days, and it is this phase of things to which Mr. Washburn refers in the above lines.

"It is a well-known fact that Mr. Lincoln hesitated to show his strength of conscience, as he did his wealth of goodness, lest it be counted as ostentation. He said often in 1854-55, 'The saloon and the liquor traffic have defenders—but no defense!' With him men were neither great nor small—they were right or wrong. He knew no fear except the fear of doing wrong. His expressions and conduct on this question of the prohibition of the liquor traffic and the saloon were so firmly anchored on his profound convictions of right and wrong that they were immutable.

"In that memorable canvass, Mr. Lincoln and myself spoke in Jacksonville, in Bloomington, in Decatur, in Danville, in Carlinville, in Peoria, and at many other points.

"The gist of Mr. Lincoln's argument was contained in this fearless declaration:

"'This legalized liquor traffic, as carried on in the saloons and grogshops, is the tragedy of civilization. Good citizenship demands and requires that what is right should not only be made known, but be made prevalent; that what is evil should not only be detected and defeated, but destroyed. The saloon has proved itself to be the greatest foe, the most blighting curse of our modern civilization, and this is why I am a practical prohibitionist.

"'We must not be satisfied until the public sentiment of this State, and the individual conscience shall be instructed to look upon the saloon-keeper and the liquor-seller, with all the license each can give him, as simply and only a privileged malefactor—a criminal.'

"Mr. Lincoln used, in advocating the entire prohibition of the liquor traffic, nearly the same language, and in many instances the same illustrations that he used later on in his arguments against slavery. At another place he said:

"'The real issue in this controversy, the one pressing upon every mind that gives the subject careful consideration, is that legalizing the manufacture, sale, and use of intoxicating liquors as a beverage is a wrong—as all history and every development of the traffic proves it to be—a moral, social, and political wrong.'

"It should be stated distinctly, squarely, and fairly, and repeated often, that Mr. Lincoln was a practical total abstinence man; wrote for it, worked for it, taught it, both by precept and by example; and when, from a long and varied experience, he found that the greed and selfishness of the liquor-dealers and the saloon-keepers overleaped and disregarded all barriers and every other restraint, and taught by the lessons of experience that nothing short of the entire prohibition of the traffic and the saloon would settle the question, he became an earnest, unflinching prohibitionist.

"None of us can get too many views of the good and great Lincoln, and the world grows better for all we know, or can learn of him.... I spoke in New Haven last Sunday evening in one of the largest churches in the old college town. The house was packed with Yale students and others. The subject was, 'Lincoln, the Christian Statesman,' emphasizing the religious phase of the man, much to the surprise of many present. This was the real source of his strength. He was larger than any or all so-called 'denominations,' and yet a multitude find both comfort and strength in these various divisions, and Lincoln's heart was glad it was so."