With the first lines of his speech drawing an allegorical reference to Biblical .
timeframes, President Lincoln looks to define that it is divine destiny for the .
Untied States to move through the tumultuous, painful period that the thousands .
of dead soldiers, both from the Confederate and Union sides, and be the stronger .
for it. The purpose of his travel to Gettysburg was to dedicate a new cemetery .
for the Union soldiers killed during the battle of Gettysburg. He gave the speech .
on November 19, 1863 to approximately fifteen to twenty thousand who had .
gathered to hear his convocation of the cemetery. Lincoln realized that the .
nation must seek a transformation, away from the divisiveness and towards unity, .
and he freely calls on a Biblically-based use of time-based terms to connote that .
it is indeed divine providence that led to the creation of the United States to begin .
with, and that it is the responsibility of all citizens to keep this creation of God .
alive. He is in fact calling out all citizens to the responsibility of the "preservation .
of freedom and the birth of a new Union" (Lincoln (9). .
From this core thought, all other thoughts are based on. The preservation of .
freedom and liberty is core to his message. He quickly links thus concept to the .
honoring of the dead that gave their lives for the just cause of preserving the .
Union and with it, freedom and liberty. Unlike other orators of his day, he odes .
not evoke romantic imagery, he instead lays the responsibility for preserving the .
Union with those in the audience, telling them and the nation that those fallen in .
the fight for the preservation of the Union will not have died in vain. This aspect .
of the Gettysburg address has also been often used in major national events .
including the speech given by President Bush and also by Mayor Giuliani during .
the speeches they made at Ground Zero in downtown New York (Stow, 195 - .