Page:Southern Historical Society Papers volume 40.djvu/153

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I desire, in simple language, to speak briefly of the great and good man whom the statue to be erected here is to commemorate.

Simplicity of speech becomes any remarks about one whose simplicity of character was so marked a feature of his greatness.

Nor will, nor need the truth be colored in his eulogy.

Extravagance of statement would rather detract from than add to his moral and intellectual stature.

There have been many delineations of the character of Stonewall Jackson—some true to nature and to the facts, some so exaggerated in one direction as to be fanciful, and some so distorted in another direction as to make him appear grotesque.

To those who knew him best in peace, to his family, his pastor, his servants, his friends, and the poor; to those who knew him best in war, the members of his staff, the officers who served under or with him, and were thrown intimately with him, in camp, on the march, and upon the field of battle; to the soldiers of his brigade, division, and army, who, through two years of tremendous effort and glorious achievement, bivouacked,