worth,
And brave old wisdom of sincerity!
They knew that outward grace is dust;
They could not choose but trust
In that sure-footed mind's unfaltering skill,
And supple-tempered will
That bent like perfect steel to spring again and thrust.
His was no lonely mountain-peak of mind,
Thrusting to thin air o'er our cloudy bars,
A sea-mark now, now lost in vapors blind;
Broad prairie rather, genial, level-lined,
Fruitful and friendly for all human kind,
Yet also nigh to heaven and loved of loftiest stars.

* * * * *

I praise him not; it were too late;
And some innative weakness there must be
In him who condescends to victory
Such as the Present gives, and cannot wait,
Safe in himself as in a fate.
So always firmly he:
He knew to bide his time,
And can his fame abide,
Still patient in his simple faith sublime,
Till the wise years decide.
Great captains, with their guns and drums,
Disturb our judgment for the hour,
But at last silence comes;
These all are gone, and, standing like a tower,
Our children shall behold his fame.
The kindly-earnest, brave, foreseeing man,
Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not blame,
New birth of our new soil, the first American.

OUR ABRAHAM

OUT of the mellow West there came
A man whom neither praise nor blame
Could gild or tarnish; one who rose
With fate-appointed swiftness far
Above his friends, above his foes;
Whose life shone like a splendid star,
To fill his people's hearts with flame;
Who never sought for gold or fame;
But gave himself without a price—
A willing, humble sacrifice—
An erring Nation's Paschal Lamb—
The great, gaunt, patient Abraham.

I never saw his wrinkled face,
Where tears and smiles disputed place;
I never touched his homely hand,
That seemed in benediction raised,
E'en when it emphasized command,
What time the fires of battle blazed,
The hand that signed the act of grace
Which freed a wronged and tortured race;
And yet I feel that he is mine—
My country's; and that light divine
Streams from the saintly oriflamme
Of great, gaunt, patient Abraham.

He was our standard-bearer; he
Caught up the thread of destiny,
And round the breaking Union bound
And wove it firmly. To his task
He rose gigantic; nor could sound
Of menace daunt him. Did he ask
For homage when glad Victory
Followed his flags from sea to sea?
Nay, but he staunched the wounds of war;
And you owe all you have and are—
And I owe all I have and am
To great, gaunt, patient Abraham.

The pillars of our temple rocked
Beneath the mighty wind that shocked
Foundations that the fathers laid;
But he upheld the roof and stood
Fearless, while others were afraid;
His sturdy strength and faith were good,
While coward knees together knocked,
And traitor hands the door unlocked,
To let the unbeliever in.
He bore the burden of our sin,
While the rebel voices rose to damn
The great, gaunt, patient Abraham.

And then he died a martyr's death—
Forgiveness in his latest breath,
And peace upon his dying lips.
He died for me; he died for you;
Heaven help us if his memory slips
Out of our hearts! His soul was true
And clean and beautiful. What saith
Dull history that reckoneth
But coldly? That he was a man
Who loved his fellows as few can;
And that he hated every sham—
Our great, gaunt, patient Abraham.

Majestic, sweet, was Washington;
And Jefferson was like the sun—
He glorified the simplest thing
He touched; and Andrew Jackson seems
The impress of a fiery king
To leave upon us: these in dreams
Are oft before us; but the one
Whose vast work was so simply done—
The Lincoln of our war-tried years—
Has all our deepest love; in tears,
We chant the In Memoriam
Of great, gaunt, patient Abraham.

LINCOLN, THE MAN OF THE PEOPLE[D]

Edwin Markham

This poem, which is considered one of the two best tributes ever paid to Lincoln, the other being Walt Whitman's O Captain! My Captain! is a tremendously virile and earnest summing up of the meaning of the man (Lincoln) and his life; a lesson in patriotism and a masterful piece of hero worship.

WHEN the Norn-Mother saw the Whirlwind Hour
Greatening and darkening as it hurried on,
She left the Heaven of Heroes and came down
To make a man to meet the mortal need.
She took the tried clay of the common road—
Clay warm yet with the genial heat of Earth,
Dashed through it all a strain of prophecy;
Tempered the heap with thrill of mortal tears;
Then mixed a laughter with the serious stuff.
It was a stuff to hold against the world,
A man to match our mountains, and compel
The stars to look our way and honor us.

The color of the ground was in him, the red earth;
The tang and odor of the primal things;
The rectitude and patience of the rocks;
The gladness of the wind that shakes the corn;
The courage of the bird that dares the sea;
The justice of the rain that loves all leaves;
The pity of the snow that hides all scars;
The loving-kindness of the wayside well;
The tolerance and equity of light
That gives as freely to the shrinking weed
As to the great oak flaring to the wind—
To the grave's low hill as to the Matterhorn
That shoulders out the sky.

And so he came.
From prairie cabin up to Capitol,
One fair Ideal led our chieftain on.
Forevermore he burned to do his deed
With the fine stroke and gesture of a king.
He built the rail-pile as he built the State,
Pouring his splendid strength through every blow,
The conscience of him testing every stroke,
To make his deed the measure of a man.

So came the Captain with the mighty heart;
And when the step of Earthquake shook the house,
Wrenching the rafters from their ancient hold,
He held the ridgepole up, and spiked again
The rafters of the Home. He held his place—
Held the long purpose like a growing tree—
Held on through blame and faltered not at praise.
And when he fell in whirlwind, he went down
As when a kingly cedar green with boughs
Goes down