LOWKLL, JAMKS Kl'SSKLL. 



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Then follows the famous description of ftpring 



.mil, mi. I tin 'it more .if tliitl sharp, 

 ;!- which probably hud more influence 

 in;,' tiling in tin- right light for the NV\v 

 Kngland mind tlnni I lie gravest sci-moim or 

 editorials. 



It wiis not with poetical satire alone that Mr. 



well attacked slavery ami upheld the nation- 



caiise in the final era-h of war. Klegant 

 writings in proM- i aim- from his pen, while tlie 

 subjects tliey diM-nsM-d wen- of burning interest. 

 The fire and x.eal of (Jarrison without his intem- 

 perance and disloyalty, the eloquence of Wen- 

 dell Phillips with fir more depth of thought and 

 scholarship, were what ho showed, as contracted 

 with these two constant friends and coworkers, 



in those days. An article < The American 



Tract Soeieiy." written in 1858, shows how wide 



ran','!- his mental eye took in. He writes: 



If the pious men wlm founded the Amcriean Tract 

 Society had liccn t"l<l that within forty \ears they 

 would l>c watchful of their publications, lest, by in- 

 advertence, any thing disrespectful might bo spoken 

 ' the African slave trade ; that they would consider 



an ample equivalent for compulsory dumbness on 

 the vice.- of slavery that tkeir colporteurs could 

 awaken the minds of Southern brethren to the horrors 

 of St. Itartholoiiicw ; that they would hold their 

 e aliout the body of Cuffco dancing to the music 

 . . the cart-whip provided only thev could save the 

 soul of Sambo alive by presenting him u pamphlet, 

 which lie could not read, on the depravity of the 

 (louble-shufHc ; that they would consent to be fellow- 



cmhcrs in the Tract Society with him who sold 

 icir fellow-memlicrs in Christ on the auction-block, 

 if he agreed with them in condemning transubstan- 

 tiation (and it would not be difficult for a gentleman 

 who ignored the real presence of God in his brother 

 man to deny it in the sacramental wafer) if those 

 excellent men had been told this, they would have 

 shrunk in horror, and exclaimed: " Are thy servant* 

 that they should do these things? " Yet this is 

 precisely the present position of the society. . . . The 

 only line which Christ drew is that which parts the 

 sheep from the gout.-*, that great horizon line of the 

 moral nature of man, which is the boundary between 

 light and darkness. The society, by yielding (as 

 they have done in 1858) to what are pfeasantly called 

 the "objections" of the South (objections of so forci- 

 ble a nature that we are told the colporteurs were 

 forced to flee "), virtually exclude the black man, if 

 orn ttt the southward of a certain arbitrary line, 

 from the operation of God's providence. 



What claim lias slavery to immunity from discus- 

 ion ? We are told that discussion is dangerous. 



angerous to what ? Truth invites it, courts the 

 point of the Ithuriel spear whose touch can but re- 

 vea_l more clearly the grace and grandeur of her an- 

 gelic proportions. 



I In his article on the then pending election, 



which placed Mr.. Lincoln in the presidency, Mr. 

 Lowell said : 



The truth is that revolutionary ideas are promoted 

 not 1>\- any unthinking hostility to the ritthtsof prop- 

 erty, out to a well-founded jealousy of its usurpa- 

 tions; and it is privilege, and not property, that is 

 perplexed with fear of change. 



In an article entitled "E Pluribus Unum " 



he wrote : 



It secession be a right, then the moment of ite ex- 

 ercise is wholly optional with those possessing it. 

 Suppose on the eve of a war with Knghmd Michigan 

 should vote herself out of the Union anil declare her- 

 self annexed to Canada, what kind of a reception 

 would her commissioners be likely to meet in Wash- 



iii..-i..n ?...! the only result of our dmitting a 

 rj mi M nudity to I.e tin- giving it u right to 

 htcal it.-elf and go out again on Turmluy ' . . . \W 

 shall need som. thing like a fugitive hluv- law for 

 runaway reptihlicM, and miml get a provision i! 

 in our treaties with foreign jx.werH. that they (.hull 

 help us catch any delinquent who muy tukc refuge 

 with them. 



It has sometime* been i|nc-tioned just what 

 Lowell meant when, in the Commemoration 

 ( >de," he speaks of President Lincoln as t In- fir-t 

 American.' The commentary on it may perhaps 

 found in his article' on Lincoln, written in 



People of more sensitive nrganixatiorm may be 

 shocked, but we are glad that in this our true wur of 

 independence, which is to free us forever from tin- 

 old World, we have had at the head of our affairs a 

 man whom America made, as God made Adam, out 

 of the very earth unancestried, unprivileged, un- 

 known to show us how much truth, how much 

 magDUlimitT, and how much state craft await the call 

 of opportunity in simple manhood when it believes 

 in the justice of God and the worth of man. 



In the same article he thus describes a states- 

 man : 



The course of a great statesman resembles that of 

 navigable rivers, avoiding immovable obstacles with 

 noble bends of concession, seeking the broad levels 

 of opinion on which men soonest settle and longest 

 dwell ; following and marking the almost Impercepti- 

 ble slopes of national tendency, vet always aiming at 

 direct advances, always recruited from sources nearer 

 heaven, and sometimes bursting open paths of prog- 

 ress and fruitful human commerce through what seem 

 the eternal barriers of both. It is lovalty to irn-at 

 ends, even though forced to combine the small and 

 opposing motives of selfish men to accomplish them ; 

 it is the anchored cling to solid principles of duty and 

 action, which knows how to swing with the tide, but 

 is never carried away by it, that we demand in public 

 men. 



Mr. Lowell took an active interest in public 

 affairs, writing much on reconstruction and 

 kindred themes, and meantime his muse was not 

 silent. "The Washers of the Shroud," written 

 in 1861, was a lament for relatives and friends 

 who were with the Army of the Potomac. One 

 stanza runs : 



Tears may be ours, but proud, for those who win 

 Death's royal purple in the foeman's lines ; 



Peace, top, brings tears; and 'mid the battle-din 

 The wiser ear some text of God divines, 



For the sheathed blade may rust with darker sin. 



" Memoriap Positum." written in memory of 

 Col. Robert G. Shaw, killed at Fort Wagner in 

 1863, is a paean of sorrow, a preliminary study 

 for the magnificent "Commemoration Ode.*' 

 One stanza reads : 



We bide our chance, 

 Unhappy, and make terms with Fate 

 A little 'more to let us wait ; 



lie leads for ave the advance, 

 Hopes forlorn hopes that plant the desj>orate good 

 For nobler earths and days of manlier mood ; 



Our wall of circumstance 

 Cleared at a bound, he flashes o'er the fight, 

 A -aintly shape of fame, to cheer the ri^'ht 

 And steel each wavering glance. 



The noblest elegiac poem ever produced in our 



country is the " Commemoration Ode." written 

 by Lowell, ami recited by him at the memorial 

 exercises held at Harvard College, in 1865, as a 



