And State Papers 505 



make clear that he has nothing to say against any 

 opponent, no bitterness toward any opponent; that 

 all he wishes is that those who opposed him should 

 join with those who favored him in working toward 

 a common end. In reading his works and ad- 

 dresses, one is struck by the fact that as he went 

 higher and higher all personal bitterness seemed to 

 die out of him. In the Lincoln-Douglas debates one 

 can still catch now and then a note of personal an- 

 tagonism; the man was in the arena, and as the 

 blows were given and taken you can see that now 

 and then he had a feeling against his antagonist. 

 When he became President and faced the crisis that 

 he had to face, from that time on I do not think that 

 you can find an expression, a speech, a word of Lin- 

 coln's, written or spoken, in which bitterness is 

 shown to any man. His devotion to the cause was 

 so great that he neither could nor would have feel- 

 ing against any individual. 



In closing, Mr. Justice, in thanking you of this 

 church, the church so closely kindred to my own 

 Dutch Reformed Church, in thanking you for 

 asking me here, let me say how peculiarly glad 

 I am that in the chair sits one man, a Justice of 

 the Supreme Court, and that I could be escorted 

 here by another man, who has just severed his con- 

 nection with one of the highest places in the United 

 States Army, both of whom you, Justice Harlan, 

 you, General Breckinridge had enjoyed the won- 

 derful privilege of proving by their deeds the faith 

 that was in them in the days that tried men's souls ; 



