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Search - James Russell Lowell; An Address

James Russell Lowell An Address
Author: George William Curtis

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL - I892 - IN the letter of Augustus Graham, the founder of the Brooklyn Institute, dated July 4, 1848, accompanying the gift of the property to the Board of Trustees, he says I give this sum with the injunction to your Board . . . that one-half of the net income from the buildings apply to the increase and keeping in order of... more » the free library of the Institute, the residue of said income to be applied in part to the expense of an address to be delivered on the evening of the 22d of February, the birthday of George Washington, on the character of that great man, or of some other benefactor of America. Mr. Lowell had hoped, should his health permit, to deliver the address on the 22d of February, 1892. Upon his death, on the 12th of August, 1891, it was decided that, in accordance with the provision of Rlr. Grahams letter, the annual address of this year should be a discourse in commemoration of Mr. Lowell. March I, 1892. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. THE birthday of Washington not only recalls a great historic figure, but it reminds us of the quality of great citizenship. His career is at once our inspiration and our rebuke. Whatever is lofty, fair, and patriotic in public conduct, instinctively we call by his name whatever is base, selfish, and unworthy, is shamed by the lustre of his life. Like the flaming sword turning every way that guarded the gate of Paradise, Washingtons example is the beacon shining at the opening of our annals and lighting the path of our national life. But the service that makes great citizenship is as various as genius and temperament. Washingtons conduct of the war was not more valuable to the country than his organization of the Government, and it was not his special talent but his character that made both of those services possible. In public affairs the glamour of arms is always dazzling. It is the laurels of Miltiades, not those of Homer, or Solon, or or ias, whiGdihs turb and inspire the young Themistocles. But while military glory stirs the popular heart, it is thc traditions of national grandeur, the force of noble character, immortal works of literature and art, which nourish the sentiment that makes men patriots and heroes. The eloquence of Demosthenes aroused decadent Greece at least to strike for independence. The song of Koerner fired the resistless charge of Lutzows cavalry. A pamphlet of our Revolution revived the flickering flame of colonial patriotism. The speech, the song, the written word, are deeds no less than the clash of arms at Cheronea and Yorktown and Gettysburg. It is not only Washington the soldier and the statesman, but Washington the citizen, whom we chiefly remember. Americans are accused of making an excellent and patriotic Virginia gentleman a mythological hero and demi-god. But what mythological hero or demi-god is a figure so fair We say nothing of him to-day that was not said by those who - saw and knew him, and in phrases more glowing than ours, and the concentrated light of a hundred years discloses nothing to mar the nobility of the incomparable man. It was while the personal recollections and impressions of him were still fresh, while as Lowell said, Boston was not yet a city and Cambridge was still a country village, that Lowell was born in Cambridge seventy-three years ago today. His birth on Washingtons birthday seems to me a happy coincidence, because each is so admirable an illustration of the two forces whose union has made America. Massachusetts and Virginia, although of very different origin and character, were the two colonial leaders...

ISBN-13: 9781408627273
ISBN-10: 1408627272
Publication Date: 10/29/2007
Pages: 84
Rating:

0 stars, based on 0 rating

Publisher: Mac Donnell Press
Book Type: Paperback
Members Wishing: 0
Reviews: Amazon | Write a Review

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Search - James Russell Lowell; An Address

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