{
  "schema": "tga.work.v1",
  "identifier": "dresden:vol-12:tribute-to-walt-whitman",
  "slug": "tribute-to-walt-whitman",
  "title": "A Tribute to Walt Whitman",
  "subtitle": "Grave-side address at Whitman's burial, Camden, N.J., March 30, 1892.",
  "excerpt": "Ingersoll's grave-side address at the burial of Walt Whitman in Camden, New Jersey, March 30, 1892 — delivered four days after the poet's death.",
  "year": 1892,
  "volume": 12,
  "category": "Tribute",
  "author": {
    "name": "Robert G. Ingersoll",
    "wikidata": "Q360326",
    "viaf": "44331023"
  },
  "isPartOf": {
    "title": "The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll",
    "edition": "Dresden Edition",
    "publisher": "C. P. Farrell",
    "year": 1900
  },
  "license": "https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/mark/1.0/",
  "url": "https://thegreatagnostic.com/works/tribute-to-walt-whitman/",
  "wordCount": 1400,
  "body": "A Tribute to Walt Whitman\n\nCamden, N. J., March 30, 1892.\n\nMY FRIENDS: Again we, in the mystery of Life, are brought face to face\nwith the mystery of Death. A great man, a great American, the most\neminent citizen of this Republic, lies dead before us, and we have met\nto pay a tribute to his greatness and his worth.\n\nI know he needs no words of mine. His fame is secure. He laid the\nfoundations of it deep in the human heart and brain. He was, above all\nI have known, the poet of humanity, of sympathy. He was so great that he\nrose above the greatest that he met without arrogance, and so great\nthat he stooped to the lowest without conscious condescension. He never\nclaimed to be lower or greater than any of the sous of men.\n\nHe came into our generation a free, untrammeled spirit, with sympathy\nfor all. His arm was beneath the form of the sick. He sympathized with\nthe imprisoned and despised, and even on the brow of crime he was great\nenough to place the kiss of human sympathy.\n\nOne of the greatest lines in our literature is his, and the line is\ngreat enough to do honor to the greatest genius that has ever lived.\nHe said, speaking of an outcast: \"Not till the sun excludes you do I\nexclude you.\"\n\nHis charity was as wide as the sky, and wherever there was human\nsuffering, human misfortune, the sympathy of Whitman bent above it as\nthe firmament bends above the earth.\n\nHe was built on a broad and splendid plan—ample, without appearing to\nhave limitations—passing easily for a brother of mountains and seas and\nconstellations; caring nothing for the little maps and charts with which\ntimid pilots hug the shore, but giving himself freely with recklessness\nof genius to winds and waves and tides; caring for nothing as long as\nthe stars were above him. He walked among men, among writers, among\nverbal varnishers and veneerers, among literary milliners and tailors,\nwith the unconscious majesty of an antique god.\n\nHe was the poet of that divine democracy which gives equal rights to\nall the sons and daughters of men. He uttered the great American voice;\nuttered a song worthy of the great Republic. No man ever said more\nfor the rights of humanity, more in favor of real democracy, of real\njustice. He neither scorned nor cringed, was neither tyrant nor slave.\nHe asked only to stand the equal of his fellows beneath the great flag\nof nature, the blue and stars.\n\nHe was the poet of Life. It was a joy simply to breathe. He loved the\nclouds; he enjoyed the breath of morning, the twilight, the wind, the\nwinding streams. He loved to look at the sea when the waves burst into\nthe whitecaps of joy. He loved the fields, the hills; he was acquainted\nwith the trees, with birds, with all the beautiful objects of the earth.\nHe not only saw these objects, but understood their meaning, and he used\nthem that he might exhibit his heart to his fellow-men.\n\nHe was the poet of Love. He was not ashamed of that divine passion that\nhas built every home in the world; that divine passion that has painted\nevery picture and given us every real work of art; that divine passion\nthat has made the world worth living in and has given some value to\nhuman life.\n\nHe was the poet of the natural, and taught men not to be ashamed of that\nwhich is natural. He was not only the poet of democracy, not only the\npoet of the great Republic, but he was the poet of the human race. He\nwas not confined to the limits of this country, but his sympathy went\nout over the seas to all the nations of the earth.\n\nHe stretched out his hand and felt himself the equal of all kings and of\nall princes, and the brother of all men, no matter how high, no matter\nhow low.\n\nHe has uttered more supreme words than any writer of our century,\npossibly of almost any other. He was, above all things, a man, and above\ngenius, above all the snow-capped peaks of intelligence, above all art,\nrises the true man. Greater than all is the true man, and he walked\namong his fellow-men as such.\n\nHe was the poet of Death. He accepted all life and all death, and he\njustified all. He had the courage to meet all, and was great enough and\nsplendid enough to harmonize all and to accept all there is of life as a\ndivine melody.\n\nYou know better than I what his life has been, but let me say one\nthing. Knowing, as he did, what others can know and what they cannot,\nhe accepted and absorbed all theories, all creeds, all religions, and\nbelieved in none. His philosophy was a sky that embraced all clouds and\naccounted for all clouds. He had a philosophy and a religion of his own,\nbroader, as he believed—and as I believe—than others. He accepted all,\nhe understood all, and he was above all.\n\nHe was absolutely true to himself. He had frankness and courage, and he\nwas as candid as light. He was willing that all the sons of men should\nbe absolutely acquainted with his heart and brain. He had nothing to\nconceal. Frank, candid, pure, serene, noble, and yet for years he was\nmaligned and slandered, simply because he had the candor of nature.\nHe will be understood yet, and that for which he was condemned—his\nfrankness, his candor—will add to the glory and greatness of his fame.\n\nHe wrote a liturgy for mankind; he wrote a great and splendid psalm of\nlife, and he gave to us the gospel of humanity—the greatest gospel that\ncan be preached.\n\nHe was not afraid to live, not afraid to die. For many years he and\ndeath were near neighbors. He was always willing and ready to meet\nand greet this king called death, and for many months he sat in the\ndeepening twilight waiting for the night, waiting for the light.\n\nHe never lost his hope. When the mists filled the valleys, he looked\nupon the mountain tops, and when the mountains in darkness disappeared,\nhe fixed his gaze upon the stars.\n\nIn his brain were the blessed memories of the day, and in his heart were\nmingled the dawn and dusk of life.\n\nHe was not afraid; he was cheerful every moment. The laughing nymphs of\nday did not desert him. They remained that they might clasp the hands\nand greet with smiles the veiled and silent sisters of the night. And\nwhen they did come, Walt Whitman stretched his hand to them. On one side\nwere the nymphs of the day, and on the other the silent sisters of the\nnight, and so, hand in hand, between smiles and tears, he reached his\njourney's end.\n\nFrom the frontier of life, from the western wave-kissed shore, he\nsent us messages of content and hope, and these messages seem now like\nstrains of music blown by the \"Mystic Trumpeter\" from Death's pale\nrealm.\n\nTo-day we give back to Mother Nature, to her clasp and kiss, one of the\nbravest, sweetest souls that ever lived in human clay.\n\nCharitable as the air and generous as Nature, he was negligent of all\nexcept to do and say what he believed he should do and should say.\n\nAnd I to-day thank him, not only for you but for myself, for all the\nbrave words he has uttered. I thank him for all the great and splendid\nwords lie has said in favor of liberty, in favor of man and woman, in\nfavor of motherhood, in favor of fathers, in favor of children, and I\nthank him for the brave words that he has said of death.\n\nHe has lived, he has died, and death is less terrible than it was\nbefore. Thousands and millions will walk down into the \"dark valley of\nthe shadow\" holding Walt Whitman by the hand. Long after we are dead the\nbrave words he has spoken will sound like trumpets to the dying.\n\nAnd so I lay this little wreath upon this great mans tomb. I loved him\nliving, and I love him still.\n"
}