Now we are engaged in a
great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived
and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of
that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final
resting-place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might
live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But
in a larger sense we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot
hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here,
have consecrated it far above our power to add or detract. The world
will little note, nor long remember, what we say here; but it can never
forget what they did here. It is for us, the living, rather to be
dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here, have
thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to
the great task remaining before us, that from these honored dead we
take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full
measure of devotion; that we here highly resolve that these dead shall
not have died in vain; that this nation, under God, shall have a new
birth of freedom, and that governments of the people, by the people, and
for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
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