[Music] He wasn't an intellectual. He wasn't a great speaker or a brilliant writer. He wasn't, as a military leader, a a brilliant tactician or or strategist, but he had the capacity to make people want to follow him. and and if there was a more courageous human being who ever lived, I don't know who it was and it was the courage of his convictions and he would not quit. Uh every every sign was it was over, you've lost, give up, it's not worth it. But no, he he wouldn't stop. And he was the same kind of a unifying force when he became president, maybe more so. You know, it did it didn't just come to us out of the sky. It just these advantages we have, this system of life and government and our freedoms didn't just happen. Somebody had to work hard and suffer and many of them of course died to make it happen. And the doubters were all around. It wasn't as if everybody was, oh, this is a wonderful thing. let's let's go out and fight for it. A fraction of the country was for it. A fraction of the country was willing to serve in the army. I think maybe if there's a message in Washington's life is that it's that willingness to serve and not just talk about what you're going to do, but to act. It takes both and uh absolute selfless service to the country in as they said war and peace for no pay. Nothing in it for him. And then when he gets the ultimate power, as almost nobody could imagine, he gave it up willingly of his own choice. And uh this was after the war was over and he'd won. He was the conquering general. He was the hero. He could have been anything he wanted. Zar, king, potentate, whatever. He could have made the presidency into a totally different kind of office. But he relinquished power. He said, "No, I'm going back to Mount Vernon." And when George III heard that he might he George Washington might do that, he said, "If he does that, he will be the greatest man in the world." And uh because nobody had done that before. This was the the ultimate uh uh ideal of Catis, you know, that you the conquering general, the conquering hero returns to the [Music] plow. Well, when the British arrived in uh the lower bay of New York, New York Harbor, and when they came up into the bay with a force of ships, it was the largest single armada ever seen in the 18th century. Largest armada ever sent forth to suppress a another people in another part of the world in in all of history up until then. There had never been anything like it. and and they landed 32,000 troops on Staten Island, which was more than the entire population of the largest city in the colonies, which was Philadelphia. And when they came ashore at Long Island, they defeated our army. The largest battle of the of the Revolutionary War was fought on Long Island, and it was a disaster. And the retreat that followed uh was uh brilliant. uh they escaped at night from uh Long Island, from Brooklyn Heights, which was sort of the Dunkirk of the Revolution. Um a masterful demonstration of leadership on Washington's part, because an orderly retreat, even for an experienced army is the most difficult maneuver to make. And to make it with an inexperienced army at night across the East River, which isn't a river at all, but a tidal estuary, uh was almost beyond imagining. And and again the British woke up the next day as they had in Boston to discover the guns on Dorchester Heights to discover that this army they were chasing had vanished. Now that's it was brilliant and it was masterful but you don't win wars by retreating. And that's all they did for the rest of that year was uh was retreat. And the army kept getting smaller and smaller by the time they were down in New Jersey getting close to the Delaware River. uh the the size of Washington's army was only about 5,000 and probably only 3,000 of those men were fit for duty. And here here comes the British juggernaut uh with you know 25 30,000 men if they needed it. And uh that was the time that as Thomas Payne said the tried men's souls and Washington managed to get across the river and then he took stock and people were saying look it's over and we've lost but he refused to see it that way. And so what he did, what is often what one has to do when all hope's gone, he attacked. And he that's when he crossed the Delaware Christmas night and struck at Trenton and won. And then a few days later turned around, struck at Princeton and won. Now those weren't big battles. They were engagements. But the fact that he'd won, the fact that they had defeated this foe was of immense importance to morale all through the country. And that really was not just a turning point in the revolution or in our history. It was a turning point in world history because it wasn't going to be the same again after that. And that was force of force of character, force of something inside that man and those people around him, Nathaniel Green and Henry Knox, John Glover and others like that and the men in the ranks um who were few and they had no clo adequate clothing and that some of them had no shoes and men died. men froze to death that night on the march to Trenton. Just dropped dead from from exposure in the army in the on the march. And uh and he held it together. It's it's amazing. And here was a man who too few people understand. Uh loved interior decoration, loved uh architecture, loved landscape design, was an avid uh uh agriculturalist as they called it then, who uh who was festidious about his clothing, his appearance. He had all kinds of human traits that are extremely interesting and revealing. Um, everybody says he was a fox hunter. Well, what kind of a fox hunter was he? He was the kind of fox hunter that was out there at the front as close to the hounds as you could get. Very dangerous place to be. And who would not give up. He would fox hunt for seven, eight hours until they'd got the fox. He just was that kind of a person, tenacious. Well, you know, if you're going to be in a fight, that's a good kind of leader to have. And of course, we have always, as I suppose every nation and people have in all time, we admire that kind of leadership and courage. And particularly if it's in a cause that's just and a cause that's far beyond his own self arandisement or enrichment of any kind. [Music] Well, he was the leader. He was the commander and chief. He was the uh uh the the winning general in simplest terms. He won. Took a lot of good luck and help of the French and it took a long time. The longest war in our history except for Vietnam. And then once we had won, he became the stabilizing factor in the divisiveness that immediately emerged between the regions, particularly north and south. And uh and he held the country together for eight years as president. And they this isn't something that later day scholars have uh have imposed on the on the material from the past. This is in what they were saying then. He is what's holding us together. He was the the force of unity. And at that stage we needed that desperately because there were all kinds of forces outside and inside that were trying to break it up. Europe would have loved to seen this break up. The faster the better. One of the lessons of any great creative effort is that it takes all kinds of people to make it happen. And it took all kinds of people to make the miracle of the creation of the United States of America happen. And they weren't the same. They brought different qualities, different abilities, different talent. What Washington brought was the was the gift of leadership, the gift of courage, leadership, character, conviction, willpower. We will make it happen. And there's no limit to what can be accomplished with goodwill and hard work. And that's a tonic, you know, that's a powerful message, particularly for people that are struggling just to to make a to make a start. He wasn't always successful. There's an idea that we have, I suppose it comes from people who are born athletes or born musical virtuosos or whatever that he had to work hard to become George Washington. It wasn't easy. He suffered defeat. He made mistakes. He made blunders. Um he was frustrated in his ambitions again and again as a young man. He had a lot to learn. He had to uh he he had to uh get go to the wilderness which he did. I mean that's something people don't understand. You talk about someone getting into outwardbound, let's say. This was the most outwardbound young man in Virginia uh in his day when it was real wilderness and real uh adversity living uh uh with on the land or in the wilderness and his um his resilience, physical mental uh spiritual, this guy could really take it. And uh and yes, he does sometimes resort to self-pity in his letters. And yes, he can at times not tell the entire truth. And yes, he uh uh can let people down. And he's a human being. Thank goodness. Thank goodness. Look, if they were gods, they wouldn't deserve much credit, would they? Because gods can do whatever they want. These are human beings who did what they did. That's what makes it a story and that's what makes it an encouraging story, an inspirational story if I may use that [Music] word. I don't believe much in ranking presidents. I I Are you ranking them as a human being? Are you ranking them as a politician? Are you ranking them in uh in view of what they accomplished? There's so many criteria, so many measurements. But Washington was our greatest president. He was the one at the start. He held it together and he set the example. He he was the defining model of what the president should be and do. We could not have been more fortunate. I mean, you talk about good luck. Good heavens. What he could have been what he could have done that would have been so detrimental. so um disruptive and uh now Lincoln's great gift was a gift of soul a depth of soul and and once again he held the country together and fought a war successfully to free people from bondage and uh but Washington is there at the beginning and the and the revolutionary war is the most important war in our history because That's how we came to [Music] be. Well, that's of course a very subjective question. It's personal. I think what he's what he reminds us is that public service to the country, the willing to the willingness to serve is what makes it work. And nobody served longer at greater personal sacrifice uh with less monetary material reward than George Washington. Selfless devotion to the cause of the country. And I think that's a lesson that can't be stressed too often or too much. He held the country together, held the cause together, and did so um in a way that sets an example for behavior as a citizen that we can all learn from and that his picture really should be along with Abraham Lincoln back in every school room as it used to be. And uh this isn't ancestor worship or this isn't uh uh old-fashioned um history. This is the this is reality. This is the truth. And uh to be indifferent to people like Washington, to be uninterested in people like Washington is really a form in part of ingratitude. We ought to be down on our knees every day thanking God that we are part of this country and we ought to know about the people who made it possible and thank them in effect by showing interest in them and uh and their world their time. I can't overemphasize that the 18th century is one of the most interesting periods in all of human history and it's full of tumult and change just as ours is. And one other one other thing I think anytime we get down and we think oh we're living in such a dangerous uh difficult uncertain time. Oh wo is us. Uh excuse me. It's we've been through far worse than we're going through now. Uh with far greater adversity, far more eminent danger, imminent danger. Uh we have um we have suffered more. We have known darker clouds on the horizon by far than we do now. And we've come through it. And we will again. And let's draw from that example. will draw strength from strength from history. History is a source of strength and should be and Washington of course individually as a human being and as a as a figure in history is one of the protagonists of our story is a is a is a particularly uh um striking example of history as a source of strength. [Music]