From Canal Boy to President; Or, the Boyhood and Manhood of James A. Garfield by - (good short books txt) 📗

"What is more, General Garfield was religious, both by nature and by habit. His mind was strong in the religious element. His near relatives received the Gospel as it was proclaimed fifty years ago by Thomas and Alexander Campbell. He made public profession of religion before he reached his twentieth year and became a member of the same church, and such he remained until his death. Like all men of his thought and reading, he understood the hard questions that modern science and criticism have brought into the field of religion. Whether he ever wrought these out to his own full satisfaction I can not say. However that may be, his native piety, his early training, and his sober convictions held him fast to the great truths of revealed religion. Withal, he was a man of great simplicity of character. No one could be more approachable. He drew men to him as the magnet the iron filings. This he did naturally and without conscious plan or effort. At times, when the burden of work was heavy and his strength overdrawn, intimate friends would urge him to withdraw himself somewhat from the crowds that flocked to him; but almost always the advice was vain. His sympathy with the people was immediate and quick. He seemed almost intuitively to read the public thought and feeling. No matter what was his station, he always remembered the rock from which he had himself been hewn. Naturally he inspired confidence in all men who came into contact with him. When a young man, and even a boy, he ranked in judgment and in counsel with those much his seniors.

"It is not remarkable, therefore, that he should have led a great career. He was always with the foremost or in the lead, no matter what the work in hand. He was a good wood-chopper and a good canal hand; he was a good school janitor; and, upon the whole, ranked all competitors, both in Hiram and in Williamstown, as a student. He was an excellent teacher. He was the youngest man in the Ohio Senate. When made brigadier-general, he was the youngest man of that rank in the army. When he entered it, he was the youngest man on the floor of the House of Representatives. His great ability and signal usefulness as teacher, legislator, popular orator, and President must be passed with a single reference.

"He retained his simplicity and purity of character to the end. Neither place nor power corrupted his honest fiber. Advancement in public favor and position gave him pleasure, but brought him no feeling of elation. For many years President Garfield and the writer exchanged letters at the opening of each new year. January 5th, last, he wrote:

"'For myself, the year has been full of surprises, and has brought more sadness than joy. I am conscious of two things: first, that I have never had, and do not think I shall take, the Presidential fever. Second, that I am not elated with the election to that office. On the contrary, while appreciating the honor and the opportunities which the place brings, I feel heavily the loss of liberty which accompanies it, and especially that it will in a great measure stop my growth.'

"March 26, 1881, in the midst of the political tempest following his inauguration, he wrote: 'I throw you a line across the storm, to let you know that I think, when I have a moment between breaths, of the dear old quiet and peace of Hiram and Mentor.' How he longed for 'the dear old quiet and peace of Hiram and Mentor' in the weary days following the assassin's shot all readers of the newspapers know already.

"Such are some main lines in the character of this great-natured and richly-cultured man. The outline is but poor and meager. Well do I remember the days following the Chicago Convention, when the biographers flocked to Mentor. How hard they found it to compress within the limits both of their time and their pages the life, services, and character of their great subject. One of these discouraged historians one day wearily said: 'General, how much there is of you!'

"Space fails to speak of President Garfield's short administration. Fortunately, it is not necessary. Nor can I give the history of the assassination or sketch the gallant fight for life. His courage and fortitude, faith and hope, patience and tenderness are a part of his country's history. Dying, as well as living, he maintained his great position with appropriate power and dignity. His waving his white hand to the inmates of the White House, the morning he was borne sick out of it, reminds one of dying Sidney's motioning the cup of water to the lips of the wounded soldier. No man's life was ever prayed for by so many people. The name of no living man has been upon so many lips. No sick-bed was ever the subject of so much tender solicitude. That one so strong in faculties, so rich in knowledge, so ripe in experience, so noble in character, so needful to the nation, and so dear to his friends should be taken in a way so foul almost taxes faith in the Divine love and wisdom. Perhaps, however, in the noble lessons of those eighty days from July 2d to September 19th, and in the moral unification of the country, history will find full compensation for our great loss.

"Finally, the little white-haired mother and the constant wife must not be passed unnoticed. How the old mother prayed and waited, and the brave wife wrought and hoped, will live forever, both in history and in legend. It is not impiety to say that wheresoever President Garfield's story shall be told in the whole world there shall also this, that these women have done, be told for a memorial of them."