President Abraham Lincoln delivered the "Gettysburg Address" on November 19, 1863. This was in the middle of the Civil War. The occasion of the speech was the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Since this was the dedication of a memorial and burial ground of fallen soldiers, the occasion was solemn. As well as the mourning occasioned by the deaths of soldiers in the past, the mood was made even more somber by...
President Abraham Lincoln delivered the "Gettysburg Address" on November 19, 1863. This was in the middle of the Civil War. The occasion of the speech was the dedication of the Soldiers' National Cemetery in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Since this was the dedication of a memorial and burial ground of fallen soldiers, the occasion was solemn. As well as the mourning occasioned by the deaths of soldiers in the past, the mood was made even more somber by the awareness of both Lincoln and his audience that the war was still going on and that many more soldiers would die and be buried in the cemetery.
As is appropriate to such a solemn occasion, Lincoln's tone is formal and hortatory. Although Lincoln expresses sorrow for the fallen soldiers, the tone is not uniformly mournful, but rather encourages his audience to honor the soldiers' sacrifice by continuing to fight for the values for which the soldiers made the ultimate sacrifice. The conclusion of the speech shows determination and even optimism, arguing that the war should not simply be mourned but also seen as a beacon of hope, that the war was not only an emblem of death but of birth of a new political tradition, and:
that these dead shall not have died in vain—that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom—and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
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