ADDRESS OF THE
HONORABLE GROVER CLEVELAND
WHATEVER death may be to the dead, to the living it always means a loss. The enforcement of its inexorable decrees reaches humanity in every corner of the globe; and the hearts of all who live bear in painful scars the sad record of its visitations. The widow and the fatherless are always with us; and we see on every hand the dearest ties of love and friendship wrenched and broken by the insatiate foe of mortality. But we know this is our common fate, and that Divine mercy will heal and comfort these personal afflictions. And those who devoutly study the ways of God with man will gain a conception of the Infinite wisdom which has ordained that the wounds and losses inevitably and universally inflicted by death upon our individual lives, shall be the clarifying and purifying solvents which balance and strengthen the complex elements of human nature, by chastening with “the sabler tints of woe” the activities and delights of our existence.
These reflections are merely a suggestive background for the sentiments that befit this occasion. There are lives that occupy a larger area than that of individual association, and there are men who not only embrace within their affections all who need help, but whose course of life points out the way to honor and usefulness, and illustrates the grandeur of a career devoted for the public good. In our Republic the death of such a man is a direct loss to good citizenship and a hurt to our nationality—a loss more irreparable than kinship can suffer, and a hurt more grievous than personal sorrow can inflict.
It is the apprehension of this truth that has drawn together here to-night the intimate friends of Carl Schurz, who have brought tender recollections of his affectionate traits, and also many others who knew him less intimately but loved him none
[11]
