Memorial Sermon.

These are they which came out of great tribulation.—Rev. vii, 14.

T

HE scenes of twenty years ago, and more, come up before us to-day, and we pause awhile amid the memories of the silent past. Our fallen dead are imaged upon the tablets of our hearts; and their deeds of valor, which under God saved our land and preserved in honor the dear old Flag-emblem of our national life and personal liberty-shall never be forgotten. From our nation's peril, from her bloody and her priceless victory, has been born a nation's gratitude, and this has added another to our list of national holidays. To-morrow, prompted by loving hearts, trembling hands will drop the flowery tokens of love and gratitude upon the graves of our soldier dead. We come to-day in sadness and in tears, pleading a lasting benediction upon our loved and fallen heroes. The ignorant, the careless, the indifferent, may look with little favor upon those who gave their lives a sacrifice upon the altar of their country's liberty, but in the coming history of our land there shall be no page too sacred on which to write their names, and no words too golden with which to recount their deeds of valor-God bless the memory of our fallen dead-God bless their surviving comrades-for these are of those indeed who have come up out of great tribulation. Said a learned

teacher in the centuries gone by, "I never come into the presence of my students without the feeling that I should take off my hat in reverence, for I know not but that I am standing in the presence of a future prince or king." In like manner, I can hardly stand beside the grave, or come into the presence of a true and worthy soldier without the feeling that I am standing in the presence of a prince of liberty, who has already won his laurels, and to whom I owe a debt of gratitude that can never be repaid. Theirs was no mystic thought, no dreamy conflict, no shadowy victory; they gave their lives to perpetuate a principle,—a sacred, heaven-born and blood-bought principle; and we, even at the distance of more than twenty years, stand too near the field of action, with eyes too dimmed with the smoke and dust of battle, with ears too much confused with the lingering echoes of the conflict, to judge with accuracy the value of their service. Until I can know the measure of my individual rights and personal liberty, until I can measure what my country is to me, to my children, and to the coming generations, until I shall be able to fathom the meaning of that Flag, the very sight and thought of which, sends a thrill through every nerve, and is enough to stir a soul to patriotism sufficient to send him forth to die in its defence-until then, must I fail to recognize fully the service and the victory of our soldier dead and their living comrades.

In this memorial service we are standing in the shadow of a monument which has no equal among the nations of earth past or present. The rising mounds, the fallen temples and palaces, the broken

columns, the forsaken tombs of the misty past, tell us of ancient wealth and national glory, of conquest and of law, of culture, religious thought, learning and forgotten art. The movement of wandering tribes, the age of chivalry, the baronial halls and massive cathedrals of old Europe, the advances in constitutional government,-all go to show how human thought and human effort have been reaching out for the realization of an ideal long ago planted in the human soul. These, in the providence of God, have each in their way contributed to the foundation of this Monument. Not of granite rock, or Parian marble, has the structure been built, but of material older, more costly, more enduring than these. Its foundation reaches down into the very thought of God. Martyr spirits of the past have contributed material. Our fathers, as master builders under God, laid deep, and wide, and firm the foundation; they shaped, and polished, and raised the shaft; they cemented the courses with their own service, sacrifice and selves. The rising courses themselves are of human souls, who, chafing under oppression, have, at the cost of their own lives, broken the chains of servitude. Here, in this congenial clime, where the elements, we hope and trust, may not destroy, it rises, though not yet complete, a thing of beauty and a work divine.

Treason came, determined to destroy, but two million men and more, braver, nobler men the world has never seen, marched out to battle. They fought, they bled, they conquered;-weary and worn and death-struck in the conflict they returned or laid

them down to rest, THE IMMORTAL BODYGUARD of LIBERTY.

Friends, as you move within the shadow of this monument, which marks the place, and names the worth, and tells the cost of freedom, let the teardrop fall if it will, but speak gently, tread lightly, for 600,000 of the brave have ended their march, and pitched their tents, and are quietly sleeping here, while fully 1,500,000 more are on the march, and at no distant day will join their sleeping comrades in this quiet camping ground of the dead.

O Liberty!-Thou art no mere child of fortune, springing up like the mushroom in a night, or as the fabled Minerva, fresh and full grown, from the head of Jupiter-no merely tender, fair and delicate form of beauty, with shapely limbs, and dainty look, and wavy hair and angel speech. Thou art no wanton, granting the exercise of unbridled passion, and unmindful of truth, justice, law and righteousness-no selfish creature claiming for self, unmeasured license, but disregarding the rights of others. Nay! More like the mountain oak, which, inured to wind and storm and tempest, reaches deep its roots and twines around the everlasting rocks, growing stronger with each repeated blast;-like the hero, too, of many battles, returning from his victory, battlescarred, with keen and piercing eyes, with dauntless spirit, brave and firm, but kind and gentle, unmoved by praise, unwavering for the right;-yes thou art indeed the offspring of the living God and choicest of gifts divine. The cost of Liberty no silvery speech may tell, its value no artist's brush shall paint. This tongue, at least, lacks the eloquence, this hand the

skill, to tell the story, or to paint the pictnre. I can only point to the emblem, nor need I do more than this. It has its story, and it tells it well-even as no human tongue can tell it. You've marched under it, you've fought under it, you've slept under it, you've asked, if dying, to have it as your winding sheet, you've seen your dying comrade

"Smile to see its splendors fly

In triumph, o'er his closing eye."

For it you left your homes and friends and dared the rage of battle, for it you offered your fortunes and your lives. You loved that flag and you love it still. God bless the Stars and Stripes forever.

Let no one think it strange that the veteran's heart is stirred when he sees unfurled the red flag of Nihilism or Socialism or Communism or Anarchism, when he sees the old flag at half mast in honor of some unrepentant traitor, like Jacob Thompson, who instigated riot and laid his hellish plans to destroy our northern cities, then ran away from justice. Let no one think it strange that his eyes flash fire when he sees that flag insulted and trailed in the dust, and that of treason raised in its stead, at the head of a triumphal procession in honor of the Archtraitor Jefferson Davis. The battle scarred soldier knows how to be magnanimous; he can take a worthy foeman by the hand, and, when repentant, forgive; he can and does place tokens of honor and respect for valor upon the grave of a fallen foe; but, let no one ask him to hold his peace, when the prisonerstarving traitor breathes out his treason, pronounces his curses upon our Lincoln and our Grant, and urges a rising generation to reverence treason and hate the sacred principles for which three hun