For the present our strivings are not in vain. The injustice that leans upon the arm of oppression for support must fall; truth perverted or suppressed gains in momentum while it waits; generations may perish, but humanity will survive; out of the present conflict of opinion and the differences of race and color that divide, once the tides of immigration have ceased to flow to our shores, this nation will evolve a people who shall be one in purpose, one in spirit, one in destiny--a composite American by the co-mingling of blood. ABRAHAM LINCOLN[37] BY JAMES L. CURTIS, of New York [Note 37: Speech delivered on the Centenary of his birth, February 12, 1909.] Since the curtain rang down on the tragedy of Calvary, consummating the vicarious sacrifice of Jesus of Nazareth, there has been no parallel in history, sacred or profane, to the deeds of Abraham Lincoln and their perennial aftermath. For two hundred years this nation writhed in the pain and anguish of travail; and as a happy sequel to this long night of suffering, in the dawn of the nineteenth century, she bore a son who was destined to awaken a nation's somnolent conscience to a monstrous evil; to lead a nation through a fierce siege of fratricidal strife; to strike the shackles of slavery from the limbs of four millions of bondsmen; to fall a victim to the assassin's bullet; to be enshrined in the hearts of a grateful nation; and to have an eternal abode in the pantheon of immortals. * * * * * Abraham Lincoln! What mighty magic is this name! Erstwhile it made the tyrant tremble on his throne and the hearts of the down-trodden leap for joy. Now, over the chasm of two score years, it causes the drooping hopes of freemen to bud anew, and the smoldering embers of their ambition to leap into flame. With talismanic power, it swerves the darts of hate and malice aimed at a defenseless race, so that though they wound, they do not destroy. With antidotal efficacy, it nullifies the virus of proscription so that it does not stagnate the blood nor paralyze the limb of an up-treading and on-going race. When the nation was rent in twain, Lincoln, the propitiator, counselled conciliation. When the States of the South sought to secede, Lincoln, the concatenator, welded them into a solid chain, one and inseparable. When brother sought the life of brother and father that of son, Lincoln, the pacificator, advised peace with honor. When the nation was stupefied with the miasma of human slavery, Lincoln, the alleviator, broke its horrid spell by diffusing through the fire of war the sweet incense of liberty.