Page:Addresses in Memory of Carl Schurz.pdf/44

 that is conspicuous. You remember in his memoirs, when, as a school-boy, he had to write a composition on the Battle of Leipzig, how he expressed his indignation at the political situation, although he knew that he would thereby incur the serious displeasure of his teachers. As the boy, so the man. Although he had eagerly assisted in the election of Grant, he did not hesitate a moment to oppose with all his might those measures of the administration which he believed would be injurious to the American people. And perhaps the most remarkable instance of this unselfish courage is, when he advocated with unceasing energy the re-establishment of the suffrage in the South, although he clearly saw that he was thereby helping to create a democratic majority in Missouri and that he would in consequence lose his seat in the Senate of the United States.

This same trait of chivalry is found everywhere: a vigorous fight for what he regarded as just and good, a fight with the splendid ardor of his enthusiastic spirit, with all the captivating force of his remarkable personality. As a result, many misapprehensions and enmities were unavoidable, and it was as a poor man that there died the ablest and most influential of all those of foreign birth and foreign education who have made their home on this side of the Atlantic.

But when we admire in Schurz the incarnation of what we call German idealism we regard not only the moral impulse which prompted him to decide all public questions without reference to his personal interests, but also the intellectual faculty of looking at all problems of practical life from the loftiest points of view. This Carl Schurz did in a most unusual manner. He believed, as he often emphasized, in the logic of things, in an over-ruling fatality, which stands above the power of majorities and of governments. “It is the close connection between cause and effect, between principle and fact,” he explained—“a connection which cannot be severed and a clear knowledge of which is the only safe foundation of political wisdom.” He was convinced that “what is nonsense in theory, will never make sense in practice.” But from this he did not conclude that men could not intervene. On the contrary, he considered it the duty of