because in the vital matters fundamentally affecting the life of the Republic she was as good a citizen of the Republic as Washington and Lincoln themselves. She was in the highest sense a good wife and a good mother, and therefore she fulfilled the primary law of our being. She brought up with devoted care and wisdom her sons and her daughters. At the same time she fulfilled her full duty to the commonwealth from the public standpoint. She preached righteousness and she practised righteousness. She sought the peace that comes as the handmaiden of well-doing. She preached that stern and lofty courage of soul which shrinks neither from war nor from any other form of suffering and hardship and danger if it is only thereby that justice can be served. She embodied that trait more essential than any other in the make-up of the men and women of this Republic—the valor of righteousness.”
In the letter given below, Hon. George F. Hoar, United States Senator from Massachusetts, compares “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” with the “Marseillaise” and with the “British National Anthem.”
Worcester, Mass., May 22, 1903.
I was thinking, just as I got your letter asking me to send a greeting to your meeting and to Mrs. Howe, of the great power, in framing the character of nations, of their National Anthems. Fletcher of Saltoun said, as every child knows, “Let me make the songs of a people, and I care not who make their laws.” No single influence has had so much to do with shaping the destiny of a nation, as nothing more surely expresses national character, than what is known as the National Anthem. France adopted for hers the “Marseillaise.” Its stirring appeal
Sons of France, awake to glory!
led the youth of France to march through Europe, subduing kingdoms and overthrowing dynasties, till “forty centuries looked down on them from the pyramids.” At last the ambition of France perished and came to grief, as every unholy ambition is destined to perish and come to grief, and her great Emperor died in exile at St. Helena.
Is there anything more cheap and vulgar than the National Anthem of our English brethren, “God Save the King”?
O Lord our God, arise!
Scatter his enemies
And make them fall.