Rensselaer Republican, Volume 13, Number 12, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 10 December 1880 — Gen. Ben. Harrison's Eilogian. [ARTICLE]

Gen. Ben. Harrison's Eilogian.

Spokau * t th* O j>*raor WlUl* ■ ’a Manorial 11**U*( Governor Williams’ name and my own were associated in one of tiie sharpest political contests, perhaps, tliat nas been witnessed j;j the state, and yet to-day, sir, as I loooked upon his quiet face*it was a pleasant reflection to me that, so far as l know, this contest had developed no personal unkindness to me. If the Uccased Governor ever at any time uttered an unkind word of me, it never reached my ears. lam sure that in the entire campaign no one heard from my lips any word of personal bitterness or unkindness. I thought to-day that there was a lesson in this for all of us—that there comes » time In tiie }iv«i of men, jmrticularly with those who jive nearest, when any act or word of hittemessror spoken slander becomes a bitter memory. lam glad to be able here to-day to mingle with those who stood nearer to him than I did, my own expressions of sincere regret at the deatmof Governor Williams. The constitution of Indiana provides that the governar shall hold It is offlpp for four years. That sir, is written of tiie office—not of the man. God appoints the tenures of human life, and their length is controlled by hh| unfathomable will. It seems to us inopportune, this dying before the official term was closed, that he should have been deprived of the opportunity of speaking the farewell word of counsel to the legislature of Indiana, and of handing over to his successor the insignia of his office. But we don’t judge these things rightly, I suppose, I never quite liked in the cemetery or even in the hall below this type otthe broken shaft. We shall know sometime, I expect, that every life has been complete. If there were nothing to be said of Governor Williams’ relation to public aflkirs of Indiana at all, his life would be an honorable and successful one. I havenalways felt that the successful pioneer, one of those who pressed toward the edge of -civijiaatton In the early days and made a successjfol fight with the wilderness, and cleared tha pijjared forest and made of It a meadow, and of the marsh a dry field, and who feiDt up around him and for himself and for w»e family that God gave him * competence, elevated them, that that life was an honorable life and worthy of mention in any assembly. This work Governor Williams has done conspicuously. There was „to me a yery touching sight. It is what has been alluded to iff the memorial which you have heard. For fifty years “he had lived with that wife who had preceded him a few months to that door that opens not outward, W® »re often apt to think of this revelation as that of one,

I 1 think wg no not rifrhtlv <k scribe it when we think of it so. It is but a single aspect of that most tender relation in life. Umloubtedlv the stalwart man who lies dead In our midst to-day knew what It was to lean on the wife, and it is tender and touching beyond expression to-day to feel that when that support was withdrawn the toll man bowed hirneMf, and awaited not regretfully the coming of death. With the sincerest heart I unite to-day with those who knew him better in this test mon.'al of respect to his memory.