Mr. Asquith made one of those short speeches without any
flummery, and yet in no sense dull, in which he excels. One of his points has not been hitherto recognized in America as it should be. The Americans take pride in our great names, but, said Mr. Asquith very truly. we Englishmen take equal pride in the great men whom America has produced since the formal separation. As we have often pointed out to Americans, Abraham Lincoln is quite as great a hero here as he is in America. We say with. out fear of contradiction that at no public gathering in England is it possible to use the name of Lincoln or to quote any of his sayings without awakening a cheer of the warmest sympathy. We feel that the great preserver of the Union is he much our spiritual possession as that of America. When- ever one wants to find some words of essential and funda- mental political wisdom on a concrete point of English politics, one is quite as likely to find them in Lincoln as in the works of any English political philosopher. The exclusion of Ulster is a case in point. Lincoln's letter on the refusal of the seceding State of Virginia to allow West Virginia to secede from it puts the whole Ulster case better than it has ever been put, even by Sir Edward Carson.
Previous page
