Will Dockery wrote:
Rudy Canoza <rc> posted:
MummyChunk wrote:
jeannekhan@aol.com wrote:
The appendix to Susan Jacoby's Freethinkers had this eulogy
delivered
by Robert Green Ingersoll, a copy of which I pluck from a Book
of Wisdom
site where such items are available to Humanists and
Freethinkers:
A TRIBUTE TO WALT WHITMAN.
Camden, N.J., March 30, 1892.
MY FRIENDS: Again we, in the mystery of Life, are brought face
to face with the mystery of Death. A great man, a great
American, the most eminent citizen of this Republic, lies dead
before us, and we have met to pay a tribute to his greatness
and his worth.
I know he needs no words of mine. His fame is secure. He laid
the foundations of it deep in the human heart and brain. He
was, above all I have known, the poet of humanity, of sympathy.
He was so great that he rose above the greatest that he met
without arrogance, and so great that he stooped to the lowest
without conscious condescension. He never claimed to be lower
or greater than any of the sons of men.
He came into our generation a free, untrammeled spirit, with
sympathy for all. His arm was beneath the form of the sick. He
sympathized with the imprisoned and despised, and even on the
brow of crime he was great enough to place the kiss of human
sympathy.
One of the greatest lines in our literature is his, and the
line is great enough to do honor to the greatest genius that
has ever lived. He said, speaking of an outcast: "Not till the
sun excludes you do I exclude you."
His charity was as wide as the sky, and wherever there was
human suffering, human misfortune, the sympathy of Whitman bent
above it as the firmament bends above the earth.
He was built on a broad and splendid plan -- ample, without
appearing to have limitations -- passing easily for a brother
of mountains and seas and constellations; caring nothing for
the little maps and charts with which timid pilots hug the
shore, but giving himself freely with recklessness of genius to
winds and waves and tides; caring for nothing as long as the
stars were above him. He walked among men, among writers, among
verbal varnishers and veneerers, among literary milliners and
tailors, with the unconscious majesty of an antique god.
He was the poet of that divine democracy which gives equal
rights to all the sons and daughters of men. He uttered the
great American voice; uttered a song worthy of the great
Republic. No man ever said more for the rights of humanity,
more in favor of real .
democracy, of real justice. He neither scorned nor cringed, was
neither tyrant nor slave. He asked only to stand the equal of
his fellows beneath the great flag of nature, the blue and
stars.
He was the poet of Life. It was a joy simply to breathe. He
loved the clouds; he enjoyed the breath of morning, the
twilight, the wind, the winding streams. He loved to look at
the sea when the waves burst into the whitecaps of joy. He
loved the fields, the hills; he was acquainted with the trees,
with birds, with all the beautiful objects of the earth. He not
only saw these objects, but understood their meaning, and he
used them that he might exhibit his heart to his fellow-men.
He was the poet of Love. He was not ashamed of that divine
passion that has built every home in the world; that divine
passion that has painted every picture and given us every real
work of art; that divine passion that has made the world worth
living in and has given some value to human life.
He was the poet of the natural, and taught men not to be
ashamed of that which is natural. He was not only the poet of
democracy, not only the poet of the great Republic, but he was
the Poet of the human race. He was not confined to the limits
of this country, but his sympathy went out over the seas to all
the nations of the earth.
He stretched out his hand and felt himself the equal of all
kings and of all princes, and the brother of all men, no matter
how high, no matter how low.
He has uttered more supreme words than any writer of our
century, possibly of almost any other. He was, above all
things, a man, and above genius, above all the snow-capped
peaks of intelligence, above all art, rises the true man,
Greater than all is the true man, and he walked among his
fellow-men as such.
He was the poet of Death. He accepted all life and all death,
and he justified all. He had the courage to meet all, and was
great enough and splendid enough to harmonize all and to accept
all there is of life as a divine melody.
You know better than I what his life has been, but let me say
one thing. Knowing, as he did, what others can know and what
they cannot, he accepted and absorbed all theories, all creeds,
all religions, and believed in none. His philosophy was a sky
that embraced all clouds and accounted for all clouds. He had a
philosophy and a religion of his own, broader, as he believed
-- and as I believe -- than others. He accepted all, he
understood all, and he was above all.
He was absolutely true to himself. He had frankness and
courage, and he was as candid as light. He was willing that all
the sons of men should be absolutely acquainted with his heart
and brain. He had nothing to conceal. Frank, candid, pure,
serene, noble, and yet for years he was maligned and slandered,
simply because he had the candor of nature. He will be
understood yet, and that for which he was condemned -- his
frankness, his candor -- will add to the glory and greatness of
his fame.
He wrote a liturgy for mankind; he wrote a great and splendid
psalm of life, and he gave to us the gospel of humanity -- the
greatest gospel that can be preached.
He was not afraid to live, not afraid to die. For many years
he and death were near neighbors. He was always willing and
ready to meet and greet this king called death, and for many
months he sat in the deepening twilight waiting for the night,
waiting for the light.
He never lost his hope. When the mists filled the valleys, he
looked upon the mountain tops, and when the mountains in
darkness disappeared, he fixed his gaze upon the stars.
In his brain were the blessed memories of the day, and in his
heart were mingled the dawn and dusk of life.
He was not afraid; he was cheerful every moment. The laughing
nymphs of day did not desert him. They remained that they might
clasp the hands and greet with smiles the veiled and silent
sisters of the night. And when they did come, Walt Whitman
stretched his hand to them. On one side were the nymphs of the
day, and on the other the silent sisters of the night, and so,
hand in hand, between smiles and tears, he reached his
journey's end.
From the frontier of life, from the western wave-kissed shore,
he sent us messages of content and hope, and these messages
seem now like strains of music blown by the "Mystic Trumpeter"
from Death's pale realm.
To-day we give back to Mother Nature, to her clasp and kiss,
one of the bravest, sweetest souls that ever lived in human
clay.
Charitable as the air and generous as Nature, he was negligent
of all except to do and say what he believed he should do and
should say.
And I to-day thank him, not only for you but for myself, --
for all the brave words he has uttered. I thank him for all the
great and splendid words he has said in favor of liberty, in
favor of man and woman, in favor of motherhood, in favor of
fathers, in favor of children, and I thank him for the brave
words that he has said of death.
He has lived, he has died, and death is less terrible than it
was before. Thousands and millions will walk down into the
"dark valley of the shadow" holding Walt Whitman by the hand.
Long after we are dead the brave words he has spoken will sound
like trumpets to the dying.
And so I lay this little wreath upon this great man's tomb. I
loved him living, and I love him still.
****-a-a-a-a ****
This post from 20 years ago regarding IngersollrCOs tribute
refuses to shrink Whitman into a rCLgreat poetrCY and instead
insists on a great human - someone whose democracy was lived as
sympathy: rCLNot till the sun excludes you do I exclude you.rCY
The eulogyrCOs most moving thread, for me, is how it makes
courage feel ordinary and usable: Whitman rCLnot afraid to live,
not afraid to die,rCY steady in the twilight, holding hands with
both rCLsmiles and tears.rCY
Twenty years on, it reads like a reminder that the point of free
thought isnrCOt just disbelief, itrCOs a wider, kinder
belonging.
For some in this group - a helpful thought perhaps?
Look who's xxxxxxxxxx xxxxx xxxxxxxxxx xxxxx
| Sysop: | Amessyroom |
|---|---|
| Location: | Fayetteville, NC |
| Users: | 63 |
| Nodes: | 6 (0 / 6) |
| Uptime: | 492934:59:14 |
| Calls: | 840 |
| Files: | 1,300 |
| D/L today: |
3 files (1,039K bytes) |
| Messages: | 259,276 |