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 FUNERAI 
 
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 PRESIDENT LINCOLN, 
 
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 Delivered at the Capitol in Omaha. N. T., 
 
 WEDNESDAY, APlilL 
 
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 REV. F. M. EMQrfCMK: K 
 
 
 
 
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CORRESPONDENCE. 
 
 Omaha, Nebraska, April 20th, 1865. 
 Rev. F. M. Dimmick, Dear Sir: — I enclose to you the following communication, 
 numerously signed by your fellow citizens, requesting a copy of your funeral sermon, 
 delivered on the H»th inst., for publication. Hoping that you will return a favorable 
 reply at your earliest convenience, 
 
 I remain yours, truly. 
 
 R. S. KNOX. 
 
 Omaha, Nebraska, April 20th, 1865. 
 Rev. F. M. Dimmick, Dear Sir: — We, the undersigned, citizens of Omaha, feeling 
 that it is due to the great solemnity of the occasion, and to the sad bereavement 
 which has caused our community to mourn as one people ; and believing it would be 
 gratifying to our fellow citizens here and elsewhere, in the Territory, to know what 
 was expressed by you in your funeral discourse delivered on the 19th inst, commem- 
 orating the private and public life of a beloved President, assassinated, would most 
 respectfully request of you, a copy of that discourse for publication. 
 Yours, very respectfully, 
 
 Rev. T. B. LEMON, N. P. ISAACS, 
 
 Rev H. W. KUHNS, THOS. MARTIN. 
 
 Rev. WM. M. SMITH. JOHN H. BRACK KN. 
 
 GEO. R. SMITH. C. H. DOWNS, 
 
 DAN'L GANTT. MILTON ROGERS. 
 
 JOHN RITCHIE. ALBERT TUCKER, 
 
 A. KOUNTZE, JOHN M< CORMICK, 
 
 F. DOUTHITT, FERDINAND BUNN. 
 
 L. J. KENNARD. GEO. B. LAKE, 
 
 P. HUGUS, E. EST A BROOK, 
 
 W. H. LAWTON. JAMES FORSYTH. 
 
 O. P. HURFORD. R. S. KNOX. 
 
 Omaha, Nebraska Territory, April 21. 1865. 
 R. S. Kxox, Esq., My Dear S'rr : — Your communication of yesterday, enclosing 
 quite a general request on the part of the citizens of this place, for a copy of my 
 sermon on the funeral occasion of President Lincoln, for the press, is betore me. — 
 The discourse was prepared in great haste, without any thought of publication. But 
 if my* fellow citizens deem it fitted to further, in the least, the great cause of truth 
 and righteousness, it is entirely at their disposal. 
 
 Believe me most truly yours, 
 
 F. M. DIMMICK 
 
FUNERAL SERMON. 
 
 
 •■ Know ye hot thai there is a prfaftee and a great man fallen this dav in Israel ? l! 
 
 II Sum,*,/':), :»„S. 
 
 Tliis was the exclamation of king David on the death of Aimer. — 
 Joab "hafi treacherously sent for Aimer, of whom lie was jealous, and 
 under the pretext of a private conference with him, at the gate of the 
 city in Hebron, he slew him. Like a coward and a villain, under the 
 color of a friendly interview, he rose up against Abuer and assassinated 
 him. And as in the ease of the first murder <m the records of time, the 
 better man is killed and the assassin lives. So to-day we are called 
 to write one of the darkest pages of our nation's history. To-day we 
 Kan exclaim, in the language of the anointed king of Israel, on the 
 death of Saul and Jonathan: wk How are the mighty fallen !" The chief 
 executive of a great nation — the head — the father — of thirty millions 
 of people, has been stricken down by the hand of the assassin ! A 
 nation is called, to-day. to mourn its loss. 
 
 kk When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice : " but when 
 a good man dies the hearts of the people are sad. When Moses died 
 the children oFIsrael wep1 and mourned for him, in the plain's of Moab, 
 thirty days. 
 
 That the death of great and useful men should be particularly noticed, 
 is equally the dictate of reason ami revelation. But neither examples 
 nor arguments are necessary to awaken the sympathies of a grateful 
 people on such occasions. The death of public benefactors surcharges 
 the heart, and it naturally and spontaneously disburdens itself in a flow 
 of sorrows. 
 
To ajo l>ack only a few years, — such was the death of President 
 Harrison and of President Taylors But such, also, and more peculiarly 
 -o. is the death of Pi<ksii>kn t Lin< oi.x. The tidings of the former 
 moved, us — saddened our hearts — and the nation was in tears. But the 
 uccotiiit <>f tile latter, blighted our joys, eliilled for a time our hopes, 
 and curdled our blood ! The former died in a good ©lid age, the latter 
 was cut off in the midst of his years and his usefulness. The former 
 wars a customary Providence — they died at home a natural death, sur- 
 rounded l>y their families and their friends :ind \ve saw in it the hand of 
 (rod, and bowed submissively to His sovereign pleasure. The latter is not 
 •ttcnded with these southing circumstances ; though permitted in the 
 dee]>. mysterious j»rovidenees of the . great Disposer of events, still, 
 humanly speaking, we see little vet, but the hetidish malice and hand 
 of the asv.issin. 
 
 His fall owes its existence to the same spirit which has robbed us of 
 tens of thousands of our noblest born in this terrible contiiet. It is 
 marked by violence, and is the work <d' mad deliberation. The time, 
 the place, the circumstances, are arranged with satanic ingenuity and 
 barbarous coolness. The deadly weapon is tired in an hour of quiet, 
 and in an unexpected moment, whilst surrounded by friends. And the 
 event has proven that it was too well directed. It is the natural fruit 
 of that envenomed upas tree, which has poisoned and dried up the life 
 blood of society, and which, so help us (iod, shall speedilv be hewn 
 down, and dug up. root and branch ! 
 
 O, how sad it is that our beloved, our good, our true-hearted Presi- 
 dent should die thus ! Humiliating end of illustrious greatness. "How 
 are the mighty fallen T And shall the mighty still fall thus;' Shall 
 the noblest lives be sacrificed, and the best 'blood shed by the hand of 
 the assassin? (_) "Tell it not in Gram : publish it not in the streets of 
 6T Askalon ; lest the daughters of the Philistines — our enemies — re 1 
 pice:" lest the hosts of darkness shout in their fiendish triumph ! 
 
 Abkaham Li^coi.x, whose death we deeply mourn to-day. was born 
 in Kentucky, and while yet a boy. his father migrated to Illinois; and 
 there in a new country, amid the hardships and privations incident to a 
 pioneer life, he had his early training. There he learned many lessons 
 from the rough side of nature : and there he acquired that habit of 
 thorough investigation and self-reliance which has been a peculiar char- 
 acteristic of his public life. He was elected to the State Legislature, 
 and to Congress, and showed himself, especially, in his political contest 
 with Stephen A. Douglas, ail honest man, a true-hearted patriot, and 
 a statesman of no common ability, no ordinary logical power and 
 
acumen, and a politick opponent, wielding the great sledge hammer of 
 truth and right, against whose Mows no public aspirant or competitor 
 could make successful headway. In the autumn of the year 1 860 lie 
 was the people's choice for the highest position in the nation. With 
 his subsequent history, your are all familiar. How, for four long years, 
 he stood patiently at the helm of our great ship of state, amid the fury 
 of the storm, and steadied her course, and headed her onward, whilst 
 the tierce breakers rose on every side, threatening destruction to all we 
 hold dear and sacred. Again, by the voice of the people he was placed 
 at the head of the nation, that he might see us, with flowing sails, and 
 favoring breezes, in the still waters, bei/mid the breakers and the storm. 
 And last Friday, the 1 ith day of April, as we were fast entering the 
 clear deep sea with its cheering sky — just four years after the bloody 
 inauguration of the Slaveholder's Rebellion by the firing on Fort 
 Sumter — the very day, that old flag we love, which had been dishon- 
 ored and trailed in the dust by the hands of perjured traitors, was 
 to be re-unfurled by the same Major Anderson, (now Major General) 
 who then carried it away to save it from further insult and shame — the 
 very day it was to be again east to the breeze over that deeply scarred 
 fort — our beloved President was struck down by the hand of an assas- 
 sin : one, embodying the spirit, and carrying out the designs of that 
 same rebel power. Fit sequel to this long quadrennial storm of treason, 
 malice, revenge and blood ! O, how unwise ! How inconsiderate, 
 how impolitic ! They have killed, the}' have assassinated, they have 
 murdered their best and their truest friend ! 
 
 O, how true that the mysterious roll of human destiny, written in 
 Heaven, but slowly unfolded, line after line, by the unerring hand of 
 Time, has many things in reserve, for us all, of which we little dream. 
 And nations, like individuals — we have learned in our history of late — 
 are sometimes shocked by the advent of calamities and afflictions, as 
 sudden and unlooked for as they are great. No one who has beheld 
 this city, and the cities through the land, during the List few days, can 
 doubt that some great and appalling stroke has fallen on the nation. 
 A great man, indeed, and a prince, has fallen in our Israel. The Chief 
 Magistrate of this Republic, to whom his loyal fellow citizens, had the 
 second time, almost unanimously confided the high executive duties of 
 the country, has been suddenly taken from us by violence. Ripe in 
 honors, and in the full possession of health, and with the promise of 
 many years more of faithful ami patriotic services before him, he was 
 treacherously assassinated. The Comtnander-inChief of all our armies, 
 
and the statesman occupying as proud a position as this world offers to 
 human hopes, has been struck down in a crisis which demanded all his 
 firmness and all his wisdom. And in that sad hour, as his family and 
 his friends stood around him, they could well exclaim : 
 
 "Can this be death? — then what is life or death? 
 
 ■• Speak !" -but he spoke not : "wake T but still he slept. 
 
 But yesterday, and who had mightier breath ? 
 
 Ten thousand warriors by his word were kept 
 
 In awe; he said, as the Centurion saith, 
 
 *' Go,'' and he goeth ; " Come," and forth he stepped. 
 
 The trump and bugle, till he spake, were dumb ; 
 
 And now naught left him but the muffled drum. " 
 
 For the third time since the formation of this Government, a Presi- 
 dent of the United States has been stricken down by death, in the per- 
 formance of his great duties. But unlike trie others, this comes unex- 
 pectedly and violently — in a moment — from a deadly weapon in the 
 hand of an assassin. And this band of fiendish conspirators, not 
 content with that, they at the same time attempt the life of the chief 
 counsellor of the President — the Secretary of State. There is evidence, 
 they designed to assassinate all the chief officers of the nation, that 
 thereby they might palsy the arm of the Government, and hurl us at 
 once from the height, the majesty, and the order of our march, into 
 confusion ami anarchy. God be praised that He has kept us from the 
 depths of such a calamity ! Still, the blow which struck the man in 
 Washington, falls heavily upon a nation's heart ; and the words of sad- 
 dened praise uttered to-day are but the echoes of the thoughts that 
 throng in the hearts of the millions that mourn him everywhere, where 
 there are true and loyal people. 
 
 Death is at all times a solemn event ; it touches both time and 
 eternity : it terminates a physical existence, it opens a spiritual and an 
 immortal one; it closes the earthly life, it introduces the christian to the 
 heavenly. But this death, the solemn obsequies of which, we celebrate 
 to-day, strikes the nation and the world with more than common sor- 
 row and solemnity. We mingle our tears with those of the whole 
 country, over the bier of the Chief Magistrate of a great nation, cut 
 down in the midst of his years, by the enemies not only of our common 
 country, but of humanity itself. And though we mourn his untimely 
 end, yet we will ever cherish and honor his memory, and claim his 
 fame for his whole country. Henceforth his history belongs not to this 
 nation alone but the whole sisterhood of nations; and his name has 
 
become a part of our common inheritance. His memory is now safe — 
 no human events will ever more affect it; the greal qualities, the 
 private virtues, the public services — all that is precious in his memory, 
 has received the seal of death. And 
 
 " The love where death has set his seal. 
 Nor age can chill, nor rival steal, 
 Nor falsehood disavow." 
 
 The secret of this illustrious man's strength and greatness, lay in his 
 being honest and true, as well as intelligent and eloquent. That is, it 
 lay in his being right hearted as well as right minded. 
 
 He might have possessed the same clearness of judgment, in dis- 
 cerning any practicable or desirable end, the same determination of 
 purpose in adhering to his maturely adopted plan for working it out, 
 and yet been as false and treacherous as Jefferson Davis, or the Arch 
 Fiend himself, the first of traitors. Would these things alone, then, 
 have made him what the loyal people of this nation have so universally 
 called him V Never ! We have learned during this rebellion that a 
 man may see very clearly a had end, and work with astonishing vigor 
 and perseverance to accomplish that end. Such a man then cannot be 
 truly great — can never be really strong. It is true, that without these 
 more active qualities, mere rectitude of intention and goodness of heart 
 might constitute a good man, but not a great man. And yet in these 
 very elements of goodness lie the essential elements of greatness. The 
 working powers of energy and will, are of no avail toward true and 
 perfect manhood, without the truer material of greatness — that is, 
 reliability. If a man has not that, (which is really honesty and good- 
 ness) who will trust him ? Though he had the energy and the intelli- 
 gence of Lucifer, who would let him work with them, or for them ? 
 And I ask where is that reliability to be sought ? In the fickle changes 
 of a man's self interest, in the declared submission to public opinion 
 and popular will, so that a man is perpetually looking without, and 
 never within for his rule of right and of action ? No ! To give real 
 body and strength to human character, there must be the strong mind 
 indeed ; but, it must be the strong mind acting harmoniously and 
 responsively to the teachings of the right heart. " If the eye be sincjle 
 then shall the whole body be full of light." Power alone is not great- 
 ness — goodness alone is not greatness. But goodness and power, 
 united so as to be one and inseparable — that constitutes true greatness 
 And the people of this land saw it there, united two in one in the person 
 of Abraham Lincoln, and therefore they have called him great. And 
 
we can truly say to-day, that it was mi honor to this people to have 
 seen him as they did, and to have placed him, once and again, where 
 they did. 
 
 How important then that a man's heart should be right ; for if your 
 hearts condemn you, know indeed, that God is greater than your hearts, 
 and will more fully condemn you. We are apt to forget the great fact, 
 that in the revelations of Christianity, judgment is not a thing which is 
 to come, but is now ; that we are actually in the kingdom of the Great 
 Judge, the God-man, who is near to us, and we near to Him. He near 
 with his supplies of grace to help in every time of need — near, knowing 
 from his human experience what man can do, as well as what he ought 
 to do, knowing from His divine omniscience every thought and intent 
 of the heart. It is not then, a remote Judge, and a remote judgment, 
 with which we have to do, but one at hand. The final judgment of 
 the great day is in fact, only the sentence educed by the sum of those 
 judgments which have gone up day by day from the thoughts, and 
 words, and works of each individual. How sad and fatal it is, then, 
 that professing christians should suffer questions of expediency or policv 
 or the opinions of men, to take the place of this simple accountability 
 of the christian conscience to the great christian Judge. And how 
 doubly sad that teachers in the church of Christ should cater to popular 
 favor ami popular opinion. 
 
 Seeing then, that we so easily fall into practical forgetfulness of the 
 great judgement which ever standeth at the door of conscience, whose 
 final awards we shall all assuredly meet, it is the business of reasonable 
 men — it is the solemn duty of responsible christian men — to see to it 
 that they are following the voice of God — that their feet are ever in the 
 path of truth, and duty, and holiness ; and that whenever in God's 
 providence, any event occurs which teaches a great lesson on this very 
 subject, they study it devoutly and reverently. " It is the purpose of 
 God, in troubling the still waters of common life, that we should notice 
 the descent of the angel, and gather health and spiritual strength from 
 the disturbed elements/* Such a visitation has now been made. 
 
 The hand, that guides unseen the arrow of the archer through the 
 joints of the harness, steadied and directed the hand of the assassin in 
 the private box of the President in Ford's Theatre in Washington, last 
 Friday evening. God was only doing, and suffering to be done, in the 
 sudden removal of this distinguished person by the hand of violence, 
 what he was just as really doing for him, and with him, every moment 
 of his previous existence. Before he came to that great office, and at 
 every instant of that momentous period of his life whilst he filled it, up 
 
to the very time when the great Judge of all the earth gave visible 
 manifestations of his presence, and of what he had never ceased to do 
 — it was no more true that he had then gone to his account, and that 
 his great Judge will one day pronounce his final award, than, that 
 every day he lived, he was going to it — the great Judge, though unseen, 
 just as near to him, and the account continually going on, and the 
 award being made. This is true of every human being; but its great 
 and startling truth is unquestionably brought more nearly home to us 
 when we have before us some noted instance like the present. A 
 man whom we loved, and who seemed like a dear friend and loving 
 father to us, cut off without a moment's warning in the midst of life, 
 and surrounded only, he supposed, by friends. Wherever he was in 
 life, and in whatever sphere he moved, the friendless had a Mend, the 
 fatherless, a father, and the poor man, though unable to reward his 
 kindness, found an advocate. For he was a counseWor whose talents 
 were employed on the side of truth and righteousness ; whose voice, 
 whether at the bar of justice, or in the halls of legislation, or in the 
 council chamber at the White House was virtues' consolation ; and at 
 the sound of which, oppressed humanity felt a secret rapture, the 
 advocates of truth received a gladdening impulse, and the heart of 
 injured innocence leaped for joy ! It was when the rich oppressed the 
 poor — when the powerful menaced the defenceless — when truth was 
 disregarded, or the eternal principles of justice violated — it was on 
 such occasions as these, that he put forth all his strength. He was ;i 
 patriot whose manly virtues never shaped themselves to circumstances, 
 and whose integrity baffled the scrutiny of his bitterest enemies. He 
 always stood amid the varying tides of party, firm, like the rock far 
 out from land, lifting its majestic head above the waters, and remain- 
 ing unshaken by the many storms and weaves which dash and beat upon 
 it. And he was a friend who knew no guile, whose heart was trans- 
 parent ; down deep in which, we could see fully rooted every tender 
 and sympathetic virtue. And he was a man whose various worth even 
 opposing parties acknowledged while alive, and now that he is dead, 
 that he has been so ruthlessly torn from us, I trust, with sincere grief 
 and sympathy they will unite to heap their honors and praises upon his 
 memory. 
 
 His life was characterized by a high sense of duty — by a steady pur- 
 pose to do what he believed to be right, [it all times, and in all places. 
 And in the performance of duty, nothing could move him — he marched 
 directly and boldly upon the road where that (allied him; and he kept 
 
his faith with all men. Vou might dissent from Ids opinions — von 
 might find fault with his judgment, hut not witli his integrity, for when 
 ho took his position after mature deliberation he kept it : — his sense of 
 duty sustained him, and opposition only served to make him the more 
 steadfast in holding it. 
 
 Suppose that more than four years ago, as he was lea vino- Springfield, 
 I1L. the future records of time in the history of his eountrv had remained 
 unknown to him. whilst a message from God had revealed the hour of 
 his death ; — Suppose he had heard the voice of God saving: " I have 
 brought you to tills great office, ami in the full career of its duties and 
 whilst the burden of saving the nation is resting upon you, you shall 
 die" It is not for any human being to say whether it would have 
 changed or modified any of the acts of his presidential career; and per- 
 haps T cannot pay him a higher tribute of praise, or s© fully express my 
 individual estimation of his character than to declare my strong personal 
 impression that it would not. 1 fully believe that every act of his 
 official life was done under the sense of personal and official responsi- 
 bility. 
 
 Such a revelation would surely have given an awful solemnity to 
 every decision — it would have suffered no veil to interpose to conceal 
 motives, and no conflict or combination <»f interests to modify the one 
 great purpose, or to repress the abiding conviction. Aye, to repress 
 the conviction kt I am making up my own judgment, even my eternal 
 judgment — and the judgment of man is nothing to me, except as it 
 responds to the judgment of my conscience and my God. I must do 
 my work — the messenger stands at the door and is knocking — the 
 eternal Judge is there — the grave is waiting — it is my work which is to 
 be done, which demands my time, my attention — and the instruments 
 I use to do it, must not be those which others like best, but such as J 
 believe will do the work most faithfully.'" 
 
 Well, my hearers, we all have a kindred revelation — not indeed of 
 the hour of death, but of the hour of judgment. It is a judgment not 
 of years in perspective, but in the awful present. The eternal n&w is 
 judging us now. It is true we know not the hour of death — it is not 
 revealed ; but come when it will, it comes not as the hour of judgment, 
 but as the hour which tells us that all judgment is at an end — the 
 balance struck, the account made up, the recording angel's duty with 
 regard to us ended. No more good works of faith and prayer, and 
 repentance and holiness ! The blood of the everlasting covenant has 
 sealed the soul for its final passage in the great inventory ! That blood 
 which tells that it has paid the debt, or dnul>Jrcf it. 
 
10 
 
 An<l as for that hour of death, w-b are not indeed told that it shall 
 come this year, or next, or thereafter ; still we arc assured that it shall 
 come some time, and it may come suddenly and unexpectedly. And 
 there is not a day we live, that we are not told it by Grod's providence, 
 which usually moves men's minds much more than his revelation. But 
 if we indeed knew just the when, it would make us serious and thought- 
 ful; and the great business of life would be to make ready for that 
 hour. A warning voice comes to-day from our nation's Capitol; and 
 the providence of God speaks to us then:-e: ,; Be ye also ready, for hi 
 an hour ye think not, the Son of Man cometh." The providence of God 'i 
 Yes, the providence of God. For there is no event however great or 
 small, which is not under his direction and his control. He so orders 
 and directs even the wrath of man. as to make it praise him, by hasten- 
 ing the great cause of truth and righteousnes he has in the earth. 
 
 At first we were startled and stupefied by the great crime which has 
 lii-ought us together to-day ; and could hardly reconcile ourselves to the 
 thought that the righteous and all wise Ruler of the nations, and 
 Disposer of events, should suffer the hand of the assassin to rob us thus, 
 of so indispensable a leader; and we thought our loss irreparable,, ami 
 called it a great national calamity* But reflection led us rather to use 
 the term, our great national affliction. For be assured God will thwart 
 the designs of the wicked, will make them drink to the very dregs the 
 cup they would press to the lips of others, ami in the end bring good 
 out of this terrible bereavement. Perhaps we were becoming to much 
 elated and self confident in view of our military successes and triumphs, 
 placing to much confidence in our leader, and were raising men into the 
 place of God, and forgetting that he alone gheth us the victory — th:ii 
 it is his hand which rules the world and is guiding this nation amid the 
 maddened elements which threatened its life. If we will now improve 
 this afflictive dispensation of Almighty God to purposes at once salutary 
 and beneficial to the great interests of the country — if we can feel that 
 in this sudden and violent death of our patriot chieftain in the vigor of 
 life, and in the full enjoyment of the highest honors — if we can feel 
 the solemnity of this sudden call of an individual so esteemed, so illus- 
 trious, so surrounded with all that could contribute to the greatness of 
 man — if we can truly appreciate the lesson which such an unexpected 
 dispensation is calculated to impart, then results the most beneficial to 
 our country, and to ourselves, may flow from it. If it teach us to 
 realize the comparative insignificance and weakness of man, and the 
 littleness of all sublunarv things — if it enable us to see more clearlv 
 
11 
 
 that this transitory lite in which arc cares, and toils, and conflicts— 
 that this brief period is but a single step in the great series of infinite 
 existence — a mere point, at which man p tuses to look around him for a 
 moment, before he launches on eternity's boundless ocean — if we can 
 rightly estimate ourselves, and lightly appreciate the duties which 
 devolve upon us, we shall then indeed have extracted from this melan- 
 choly event sonic of the lessons, beneficent and salutary, which, in the 
 deep mysteries of an overruling Providence it was designed to impart. 
 
 And although God from his eternal throne may not behold a nobler 
 object on his footstool, than the man who loves his enemies, pities .their 
 errors, and forgives the injuries they do him, and is ready to overlook 
 their crimes ; yet he intends the Magistrate, as his servant, and the 
 minister of law, to inflict its penalties, to bear not the sword in vain, 
 and thereby become a terror to evil doers. And although the indomi- 
 table courage of Abraham Lincoln — his unimpeachable honestv, — his 
 Spartan simplicity and sagacity, — his frankness, kindness, moderation, 
 and magnanimity, — his fidelity, — his generosity, and humanity to his 
 enemies — the purity of his private life — the patriotism of his public prin- 
 ciples,- -will never cease to be cherished in the grateful remembrance of 
 all just men. ami all loyal and true hearted Americans; still the very 
 fact that he was human, would lead us to expect him to err—but it 
 was always through kindness of heart, on the side of virtue and com- 
 passion. As the Chief Magistrate of a great nation, has he not ever 
 been too lenient to rebels and assassins seeking the overthrow and the 
 Aery life of that nation ? In his last public act, on the very day of his 
 assassination, with the heads of the various departments around him, 
 the telegrams tell us, he spoke very Mndfy of the chief of rebels who had 
 handled the hosts of treason and sustained their power, and slaughtered 
 by thousands our sons, our brothers, and our fathers, carrying mourning 
 and lamentation to almost every fireside through the land, and guilty of 
 the highest crime known among nations. And was there no danger in 
 the clemency of his great heart, that the highest crime in the statutes of 
 our country would go unredressed and unatoned V Were those, who 
 had made it the policy of the government, they were attempting to 
 establish at the sacrifice of ours, to murder in cold blood our soldiers, 
 and inhumanly starve them to death in marshy stockades and loathsome 
 dungeons, by the tens of thousands, to go unwhipped of justice '? Why 
 the very humanity within us cries out, that it is meet that those who 
 commit enormous crimes, should be visited with commensurate punish- 
 ment ! It is the voice of our moral nature! It is an expression of 
 
12 
 
 sympathy in the well being of society and the race. It is the onl\ 
 protection of government and of life; and nothing will culm the pertur- 
 bation of our moral nature — of the principle of justice within us in 
 view of such heaven defying crimes, hut the infliction of a corres- 
 ponding penalty. Law, with its rigorous sanctions, is a chief instru- 
 ment in moral reformations ; and is one of the main elements in the 
 means which both (rod and man must employ in meliorating the state 
 of society, and in keeping order in the world. 
 
 May we not here, then, tind another reason why, Me who ruleth among 
 the nations, should slitter the bloody hand of the assassin to rob us of OUT 
 l>cl<>ved President ? As I before remarked, they have murdered then- 
 best friend. Already we hear a different sound emanating from our 
 new Commander-in-Chief of the American armies! It sounds more 
 like holding a tighter rein upon the principal abettors of treason and 
 blood. It come*- from one who has seen the wake of desolation, and 
 heard the wail of sorrow and suffering it has wrought, — from one 
 agaiwst whom its mail waves have long beaten, and who knows more 
 of the spirit and the character it has ever manifested. And he is one 
 we trust and pray who will do right, and whom God lias trained, and 
 fitted, and raised up for this very emergency. 
 
 Let these thoughts, whilst they suggest some reasons why Grbd, in 
 his allwise providence should suffer the hands of the wicked to involve 
 us in so great and so sad a national bereavement, do not dissipate the 
 sorrows we feel, nor the sympathy we express for an afflicted family 
 and a mourning people. 
 
 We lorrd this fallen chieftain and prince of our Israel; and we bear 
 testimony to his untiring and patriotic efforts to restore the peace of 
 our country by the supremacy of its laws. He has borne his honors 
 meekly but firmly, ami ever been clear in his great office. 
 
 But he has gone now ; — he has gone, — yet we may be sure, although 
 we have him no longer for a guide and leader, that there is still that 
 omniscient and infinite Power above us, exercising that eontroling and 
 parentnl care, which has marked our progress all along through this 
 terrible <|uadrennial conflict. I believe the great Governor of nations 
 has, in a great measure, supplied the place of the departed, in our 
 government ; and that the kind, beneficent and favoring presence of 
 Almighty God will still be with us. and that we shall still be borne 
 along triumphantly in the inarch of nations, and borne onward and 
 upward by the hand of his ever sustaining Providence. 
 
13 
 
 It is true President Lincoln is dead, and a great nation to-day 
 mourns its loss; but rite God of Abraham Lincoln still fives, and they 
 can never assassinate him ! We are sale in his keeping. The great 
 cause of truth, of freedom and of righteousness is not lost, hut only 
 another name added to the catalogue of its martyrs. 
 
 Abraham Lincoln, we trust has entered into his rest — that rest 
 which remaineth for the people of God. O what a blessed thought, 
 amid our cares, and trials, and disappointments— and especially when 
 wickedness and crime stalk through the land— that there is a place 
 where there is no care, no sickness, no crime, no death ! 
 • Were this frail world our final rest, 
 Living or (-lying, none were blest. 
 Beyond the flight of time, 
 Beyond the reign of death, 
 Ther< j surely is some blessed clime, 
 Where HI'-- is not a breath ; 
 Nor life's aiieetions, transient fire, 
 "VVhose -park- fly upward arid expire. 
 Our late President died a christian ; though he received the fatal 
 wound, neither in a christian glare, nor in a christian atsnnhly. When 
 he left Springfield, more than four years ago, he was not a christian. 
 lie indeed felt the great responsibility '.of his position, and the weakness 
 of mortal man. ami therefore requested God's praying children to 
 remember him at the throne of grace. Subsequently God visited him 
 by removing from his tender embrace a darling child- Iu his bereave 
 ment he felt the \u-i'd of God's presence and consolation to sustain him, 
 hut still found not the Saviour in his peace speaking favor and love. 
 But nearly two vears ago, as he went out to the battle field at (iettys- 
 burg, strewn with the wreck of conflict, ami covered with the wounded 
 and the dying— there saw the holocausts of a nation's offering on the 
 altar of liberty, and beheld how the christian soldier could cheerfully 
 lie wounded and bleeding in his country's cause, and would readily 
 give his life, and a thousand lives, if he had so many to give, for the 
 
 land he loved, he then thought how little lie had given to that Saviour, 
 
 who had done so much for him, who had even given his life for him, 
 and kept him by his mighty power, and raised him to the illustrious 
 position he then occupied ; and therefore, then and there, he resolved 
 to be a christian and to give himself at once to the Great Redeemer of 
 men ; and he did so. There he learned to love Jesus, and found peace 
 in believing. blessed sight, which tilled heaven with rejoicing ! A 
 great man, the leader of a mighty people bows mildly to the sceptre of 
 Jesus. 
 
14 
 
 And now this great man and prince in our Israel lias fallen ! A 
 week ago, and he was the pride and the ornament of his country. He 
 stood on an eminence, and glory and honor covered him. From that 
 lofty eminence he has fallen — suddenly and forever fallen. His inter- 
 course with this living, moving, breathing world is now ended ; and 
 hereafter those who would find him, must seek him in the grave. 
 There cold and lifeless- will be the heart, which so recently throbbed in 
 friendship and love. There dim and sightless will be the eye, which so 
 recently beamed with intelligence, and there closed forever those lips 
 which so often gave utterance to thoughts that glow and words that 
 burn. 
 
 It is religion, however, that sheds the greatest glory on his character 
 and his name. It is the only inheritance he has taken with him to the 
 skies. It is all which can be enrolled of him among the archives of 
 eternity. It is all which can make his name great in heaven. 
 
 My hearers, death may come to yon suddenly and unexpectedly as it 
 did to him. Will it find you ready, and with your christian armor on ? 
 Go like him, and learn to love Jesus, and then it matters but little how 
 and when he calls you hence. You are again reminded of the uncer- 
 tainty of life, as to-day the mournful pageantry at Washington is 
 reflected through the land, for this great man who has fallen by the 
 desolating hand of a violent death ; and every loyal heart is sad, for we 
 shall see him no more here — no more on this side of eternity. 
 
 " His triumphs are o'er — he's gone to his rest, 
 To the throne of his Maker, the home of the blest. 
 How peaceful and calm he now rests on his bier ! 
 Each heart droops in sadness, each eye sheds a tear. 
 The hero, the statesman, his journey is done, 
 All his cares now are over, his last battle won; 
 Now sweetly he rests from his sorrows and fears, 
 And leaves a proud nation in sadness and tears.'