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Sociology > Education |
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23 Jul 2004 07:11:15 AM |
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Centennial Oration, DOI |
http://www.infidels.org/library/historical/robert_ingersoll/centennial_oration.html
Centennial Oration
Robert Green Ingersoll
One hundred years ago, our fathers retired the gods from politics.
THE Declaration of Independence is the grandest, the bravest, and the
profoundest political document that was ever signed by the representatives
of a people. It is the embodiment of physical and moral courage and of
political wisdom.
I say of physical courage, because it was a declaration of war against the
most powerful nation then on the globe; a declaration of war by thirteen
weak, unorganized colonies; a declaration of war by a few people, without
military stores, without wealth, without strength, against the most
powerful kingdom on the earth; a declaration of war made when the British
navy, at that day the mistress of every sea, was hovering along the coast
of America, looking after defenseless towns and villages to ravage and
destroy. It was made when thousands of English soldiers were upon our soil,
and when the principal cities of America were in the substantial possession
of the enemy. And so, I say, all things considered, it was the bravest
political document ever signed by man. And if it was physically brave, the
moral courage of the document is almost infinitely beyond the physical.
They had the courage not only, but they had the almost infinite wisdom, to
declare that all men are created equal.
Such things had occasionally been said by some political enthusiast in the
olden time, but, for the first time in the history of the world, the
representatives of a nation, the representatives of a real, living,
breathing, hoping people, declared that all men are created equal. With one
blow, with one stroke of the pen, they struck down all the cruel, heartless
barriers that aristocracy, that priestcraft, that king-craft had raised
between man and man. They struck down with one immortal blow that infamous
spirit of caste that makes a God almost a beast, and a beast almost a god.
With one word, with one blow, they wiped away and utterly destroyed, all
that had been done by centuries of war -- centuries of hypocrisy --
centuries of injustice.
What more did they do? They then declared that each man has a right to
live. And what does that mean? It means that he has the right to make his
living. It means that he has the right to breathe the air, to work the
land, that he stands the equal of every other human being beneath the
shining stars; entitled to the product of his labor -- the labor of his
hand and of his brain.
What more? That every man has the right to pursue his own happiness in his
own way. Grander words than. these have never been spoken by man.
And what more did these men say? They laid down the doctrine that
governments were instituted among men for the purpose of preserving the
rights of the people. The old idea was that people existed solely for the
benefit of the state -- that is to say, for kings and nobles.
The old idea was that the people were the wards of king and priest -- that
their bodies belonged to one and their souls to the other.
And what more? That the people are the source of political power. That was
not only a revelation, but it was a revolution. It changed the ideas of
people with regard to the source of political power. For the first time it
made human beings men. What was the old idea? The old idea was that no
political power came from, or in any manner belonged to, the people. The
old idea was that the political power came from the clouds; that the
political power came in some miraculous way from heaven; that it came down
to kings, and queens, and robbers. That was the old idea. The nobles lived
upon the labor of the people; the people had no rights; the nobles stole
what they had and divided with the kings, and the kings pretended to divide
what they stole with God Almighty. The source, then, of political power was
from above. The people were responsible to the nobles, the nobles to the
king, and the people had no political rights whatever, no more than the
wild beasts of the forest. The kings were responsible to God; not to the
people. The kings were responsible to the clouds; not to the toiling
millions they robbed and plundered.
And our forefathers, in this Declaration of Independence, reversed this
thing, and said: No; the people, they are the source of political power,
and their rulers, these presidents, these kings are but the agents and
servants of the great sublime people. For the first time, really, in the
history of the world, the king was made to get off the throne and the
people were royally seated thereon. The people became the sovereigns, and
the old sovereigns became the servants and the agents of the people. It is
hard for you and me now to even imagine the immense results of that change.
It is hard for you and for me, at this day, to understand how thoroughly it
had been ingrained in the brain of almost every man that the king had some
wonderful right over him that in some strange way the king owned him; that
in some miraculous manner he belonged, body and soul, to somebody who rode
on a horse -- to somebody with epaulets on his shoulders and a tinsel crown
upon his brainless head.
Our forefathers had been educated in that idea, and when they first landed
on American shores they believed it. They thought they belonged to
somebody, and that they must be loyal to some thief who could trace his
pedigree back to antiquity's most successful robber.
It took a long time for them to get that idea out of their heads and
hearts. They were three thousand miles away from the despotisms of the old
world, and every wave of the sea was an assistant to them. The distance
helped to disenchant their minds of that infamous belief, and every mile
between them and the pomp and glory of monarchy helped to put republican
ideas and thoughts into their minds. Besides that, when they came to this
country, when the savage was in the forest and three thousand miles of
waves on the other side, menaced by barbarians on the one hand and famine
on the other, they learned that a man who had courage, a man who had
thought, was as good as any other man in the world, and they built up, as
it were, in spite of themselves, little republics. And the man that had the
most nerve and heart was the best man, whether he had any noble blood in
his veins or not.
It has been a favorite idea with me that our fore-fathers were educated by
Nature, that they grew grand as the continent upon which they landed; that
the great rivers -- the wide plains -- the splendid lakes -- the lonely
forests -- the sublime mountains -- that all these things stole into and
became a part of their being, and they grew great as the country in which
they lived. They began to hate the narrow, contracted views of Europe. They
were educated by their surroundings, and every little colony had to be to a
certain extent a republic. The kings of the old world endeavored to parcel
out this land to their favorites. But there were too many Indians. There
was too much courage required for them to take and keep it, and so men had
to come here who were dissatisfied with the old country -- who were
dissatisfied with England, dissatisfied with France, with Germany, with
Ireland and Holland. The kings' favorites stayed at home. Men came here for
liberty, and on account of certain principles they entertained and held
dearer than life. And they were willing to work, willing to fell the
forests, to fight the savages, willing to go through all the hardships,
perils and dangers of a new country, of a new land; and the consequence was
that our country was settled by brave and adventurous spirits, by men who
had opinions of their own and were willing to live in the wild forests for
the sake of expressing those opinions, even if they expressed them only to
trees, rocks, and savage men. The best blood of the old world came to the
new.
When they first came over they did not have a great deal of political
philosophy, nor the best ideas of liberty. We might as well tell the truth.
When the Puritans first came, they were narrow. They did not understand
what liberty meant -- what religious liberty, what political liberty, was;
but they found out in a few years. There was one feeling among them that
rises to their eternal honor like a white shaft to the clouds -- they were
in favor of universal education. Wherever they went they built
schoolhouses, introduced books and ideas of literature. They believed that
every man should know how to read and how to write, and should find out all
that his capacity allowed him to comprehend. That is the glory of the
Puritan fathers.
They forgot in a little while what they had suffered, and they forgot to
apply the principle of universal liberty -- of toleration. Some of the
colonies did not forget it, and I want to give credit where credit should
be given. The Catholics of Maryland were the first people on the new
continent to declare universal religious toleration. Let this be remembered
to their eternal honor. Let it be remembered to the disgrace of the
Protestant government of England, that it caused this grand law to be
repealed. And to the honor and credit of the Catholics of Maryland let it
be remembered that the moment they got back into power they re-enacted the
old law. The Baptists of Rhode Island also, led by Roger Williams, were in
favor of universal religious liberty.
No American should fail to honor Roger Williams. He was the first grand
advocate of the liberty of the soul. He was in favor of the eternal divorce
of church and state. So far as I know, he was the only man at that time in
this country who was in favor of real religious liberty. While the
Catholics of Maryland declared in favor of religious toleration, they had
no idea of religious liberty, They would not allow anyone to call in
question the doctrine of the Trinity, or the inspiration of the Scriptures.
They stood ready with branding-iron and gallows to burn and choke out of
man the idea that, he had a fight to think and to express his thoughts.
So many religions met in our country -- so many theories and dogmas came in
contact -- so many follies, mistakes, and stupidities became acquainted
with each other, that religion began to fall somewhat into disrepute.
Besides this, the question of a new nation began to take precedence of all
others.
The people were too much interested in this world to quarrel about the
next. The preacher was lost in the patriot. The Bible was read to find
passages against kings.
Everybody was discussing the rights of man. Farmers and mechanics suddenly
became statesmen, and in every shop and cabin nearly every question was
asked and answered.
During these years of political excitement the interest in religion abated
to that degree that a common purpose animated men of all sects and creeds.
At last our fathers became tired of being colonists -- tired of writing and
reading and signing petitions, and presenting them on their bended knees to
an idiot king. They began to have an aspiration to form a new nation, to be
citizens of a new republic instead of subjects of an old monarchy. They had
the idea -- the Puritans, the Catholics, the Episcopalians, the Baptists,
the Quakers, and a few Freethinkers, all had the idea -- that they would
like to form a new nation.
Now, do not understand that all of our fathers were in favor of
independence. Do not understand that they were all like Jefferson; that
they were all like Adams or Lee; that they were all like Thomas Paine or
John Hancock. There were thousands and thousands of them who were opposed
to American independence. There were thousands and thousands who said:
"When you say men are created equal, it is a lie when you say the political
power resides in the great body of the people, it is false." Thousands and
thousands of them said: "We prefer Great Britain." But the men who were in
favor of independence, the men who knew that a new nation must be born,
went on full of hope and courage, and nothing could daunt or stop or stay
the heroic, fearless few.
They met in Philadelphia; and the resolution was moved by Lee of Virginia,
that the colonies ought to be independent states, and ought to dissolve
their political connection with Great Britain.
They made up their minds that a new nation must be formed. All nations had
been, so to speak, the wards of some church. The religious idea as to the
source of power had been at the foundation of all governments, and had been
the bane and curse of man.
Happily for us, there was no church strong enough to dictate to the rest.
Fortunately for us, the colonists not only, but the colonies differed
widely in their religious views. There were the Puritans who hated the
Episcopalians, and Episcopalians who hated the Catholics, and the Catholics
who hated both, while the Quakers held them all in contempt. There they
were, of every sort, and color and kind, and how was it that they came
together? They had a common aspiration. They wanted to form a new nation.
More than that, most of them cordially hated Great Britain; and they
pledged each other to forget these religious prejudices, for a time at
least, and agreed that there should be only one religion until they got
through, and that was the religion of patriotism. They solemnly agreed that
the new nation should not belong to any particular church, but that it
should secure the rights of all.
Our fathers founded the first secular government that was ever founded in
this world. Recollect that. The first secular government; the first
government that said every church has exactly the same rights and no more;
every religion has the same rights, and no more. In other words, our
fathers were the first men who had the sense, had the genius, to know that
no church should be allowed to have a sword; thai it should be allowed only
to exert its moral influence.
You might as well have a government united by force with Art, or with
Poetry, or with Oratory, as with Religion. Religion should have the
influence upon mankind that its goodness, that its morality, its justice,
its charity, its reason, and its argument give it, and no more. Religion
should have the effect upon mankind that it necessarily has, and no more.
The religion that has to be supported by law is. without value, not only,
but a fraud and curse. The religious argument that has to be supported by a
musket, is hardly worth making. A prayer that must have a cannon behind it,
better never be uttered. Forgiveness ought not to go in partnership with
shot and shell. Love need not carry knives and revolvers.
So our fathers said: "We will form a secular government, and under the flag
with which we are going to enrich the air, we will allow every man to
worship God as he thinks best." They said: "Religion is an individual thing
between each man and his creator, and he can worship as he pleases and as
he desires." And why did they do this? The history of the world warned them
that the liberty of man was not safe in the clutch and grasp of any church.
They had read of and seen the thumb-screws, the racks, and the dungeons of
the Inquisition. They knew all about the hypocrisy of the olden time. They
knew that the church had stood side by side with the throne; that the high
priests were hypocrites, and that the kings were robbers. They also knew
that if they gave power to any church, it would corrupt the best church in
the world. And so they said that power must not reside in a church, or in a
sect, but power must be wherever humanity is -- in the great body of the
people. And the officers and servants of the people must be responsible to
them. And so I say again, as I said in the commencement, this is the
wisest, the profoundest, the bravest political document that ever was
written and signed by man.
They turned, as I tell you, everything squarely about. They derived all
their authority from the people. They did away forever with the theological
idea of government.
And what more did they say? They said that whenever the rulers abused this
authority, this power, incapable of destruction, returned to the people.
How did they come to say this? I will tell you. They were pushed into it.
How? They felt that they were oppressed; and whenever a man feels that he
is the subject of injustice, his perception of right and wrong is
wonderfully quickened.
Nobody was ever in prison wrongfully who did not believe in the writ of
habeas corpus. Nobody ever suffered wrongfully without instantly having
ideas of justice.
And they began to inquire what rights the king of Great Britain had. They
began to search for the charter of his authority. They began to investigate
and dig down to the bed-rock upon which, society must be founded, and when
the got down there, forced there, too, by their oppressors, forced against
their own prejudices and education, they found at the bottom of things, not
lords, not nobles, not pulpits, not thrones, but humanity and the rights of
men.
And so they said, We are men; we are men. They found out they were men. And
the next thing they said, was, "We will be free men; we are weary of being
colonists; we are tired of being subjects; we are men; and these colonies
ought to be states; and these states ought to be a nation and that nation
ought to drive the last British soldier into the sea." And so they signed
that brave Declaration of Independence.
I thank every one of them from the bottom of my heart for signing that
sublime declaration. I thank them for their courage -- for their patriotism
-- for their wisdom -- for the splendid confidence in themselves and in the
human race. I thank them for what they were, and for what we are -- for
what they did, and for what we have received -- for what they suffered, and
for what we enjoy.
What would we have been if we had remained colonists and subjects? What
would we have been to-day? Nobodies -- ready to get down on our knees and
crawl in the very dust at the sight of somebody that was supposed to have
in him some drop of blood that flowed in the veins of that mailed marauder
-- that royal robber, William the Conqueror.
They signed that Declaration of Independence, although they knew that it
would produce a long, terrible, and bloody war. They looked forward and saw
poverty, deprivation, gloom, and death. But they also saw, on the wrecked
clouds of war, the beautiful bow of freedom.
These grand men were enthusiasts; and the world has been raised only by
enthusiasts. In every country there have been a few who have given a
national aspiration to the people. The enthusiasts of 1776 were the
builders and framers of this great and splendid Government; and they were
the men who saw, although others did not, the golden fringe of the mantle
of glory that will finally cover this world. They knew, they felt, they
believed that they would give a new constellation to the political heavens
-- that they would make the Americans a grand people -- grand as the
continent upon which they lived.
The war commenced. There was little money, and less credit. The new nation
had but few friends. To a great extent each soldier of freedom had to
clothe and feed himself. He was poor and pure, brave and good, and so he
went to the fields of death to fight for the rights of man.
What did the soldier leave when he went?
He left his wife and children,
Did he leave them in a beautiful home, surrounded by civilization, in the
repose of law, in the security of a great and powerful republic?
No. He left his wife and children on the edge, on the fringe of the
boundless forest, in which crouched and crept the red savage, who was at
that time the ally of the still more savage Briton. He left his wife to
defend herself, and he left the prattling babes to be defended by their
mother and by nature. The mother made the living; she planted the corn and
the potatoes, and hoed them in the sun, raised the children, and, in the
darkness of night, told them about their brave father and the "sacred
cause" She told them that in a little while the war would be over and
father would come back covered with honor and glory.
Think of the women, of the sweet children who listened for the footsteps of
the dead -- who waited through the sad and desolate years for the dear ones
I who never came.
The soldiers of 1776 did not march away with music and banners. They went
in silence, looked at and gazed after by eyes filled with tears. They went
to meet, not an equal, but a superior -- to fight five times their number
-- to make a desperate stand to stop the advance of the enemy, and then,
when their ammunition gave out, seek the protection of rocks, of rivers,
and of hills.
Let me say here: The greatest test of courage on the earth is to bear
defeat without losing heart. That army is the bravest that can be whipped
the greatest number of times and fight again.
Over the entire territory, so to speak, then settled by our forefathers,
they were driven again and again. Now and then they would meet the English
with something like equal numbers, and then the eagle of victory would
proudly perch upon the stripes and stars. And so they went on as best they
could, hoping and fighting until they came to the dark and somber gloom of
Valley Forge.
There were very few hearts then beneath that flag that did not bean to
think that the struggle was useless; that all the blood and treasure had
been shed and spent in vain. But there were some men gifted with that
wonderful prophecy that fulfills itself, and with that wonderful magnetic
power that makes heroes of everybody they come in contact with.
And so our fathers went through the gloom of that terrible time, and still
fought on. Brave men wrote grand words, cheering the despondent; brave men
did brave deeds, the rich man gave his wealth, the poor man gave his life,
until at last, by the victory of Yorktown, the old banner won its place in
the air, and became glorious forever.
Seven long years of war -- fighting for what? For the principle that all
men are created equal -- a truth that nobody ever disputed except a
scoundrel; nobody, nobody in the entire history of this world. No man ever
denied that truth who was not a rascal, and at heart a thief; never, never,
and never will. What else were they fighting for? Simply that in America
every man should have a right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness. Nobody ever denied that except a villain; never, never. It has
been denied by kings -- they were thieves. It has been denied by statesmen
-- they were liars. It has been denied by priests, by clergymen, by
cardinals, by bishops, and by popes -- they were hypocrites.
What else were they fighting for? For the idea that all political power is
vested in the great body of the people. The great body of the people make
all the money; do all the work. They plow the land, cut down the forests;
they produce everything that is produced. Then who shall say what shall be
done with what is produced except the producer?
Is it the non-producing thief, sitting on a throne, surrounded by vermin?
Those were the things they were fighting for; and that is all they were
fighting for. They fought to build up a new, a great nation to establish an
asylum for the oppressed of the world everywhere. They knew the history of
this world. They knew the history of human slavery.
The history of civilization is the history of the slow and painful
enfranchisement of the human race. In the olden times the family was a
monarchy, the father being the monarch. The mother and children were the
veriest slaves. The will of the father was the supreme law. He had the
power of life and death. It took thousands of years to civilize this
father, thousands of years to make the condition of wife and mother and
child even tolerable. A few families constituted a tribe; the tribe had a
chief; the chief was a tyrant; a few tribes formed a nation; the nation was
governed by a king, who was also a tyrant. A strong nation robbed,
plundered, and took captive the weaker ones. This was the commencement of
human slavery.
It is not possible for the human imagination to conceive of the horrors of
slavery. It has left no possible crime uncommitted, no possible cruelty
un-perpetrated. It has been practiced and defended by all nations in some
form. It has been upheld by all religions. It has been defended by nearly
every pulpit. From the profits derived from the slave trade churches have
been built, cathedrals reared and priests paid. Slavery has been blessed by
bishop, by cardinal, and by pope. It has received the sanction of
statesmen, of kings, and of queens. It has been defended by the throne, the
pulpit and the bench. "Monarchs have shared in the profits. Clergymen have
taken their part of the spoils, reciting passages of Scripture in its
defence at the same time, and judges have taken their portion in the name
of equity and law.
Only a few years ago our ancestors were slaves. Only a few years ago they
passed with and belonged to the soil, like the coal under it and rocks on
it.
Only a few years ago they were treated like beasts of burden, worse far
than we treat our animals at the present day. Only a few years ago it was a
crime in England for a man to have a Bible in his house, a crime for which
men were hanged, and their bodies afterward burned. Only a few years ago
fathers could and did sell their children. Only few years ago our ancestors
were not allowed to write their thoughts -- that being a crime. Only a few
years ago to be honest, at least in the expression of your ideas, was a
felony. To do right was a capital offence; and in those days chains and
whips were the incentives to labor, and the preventives of thought. Honesty
was a vagrant, justice a fugitive, and liberty in chains. Only a few years
ago men were denounced because they doubted the inspiration of the Bible --
because they denied miracles, and laughed at the wonders recounted by the
ancient Jews.
Only a few years ago a man had to believe in the total depravity of the
human heart in order to be respectable. Only a few years ago, people who
thought God too good to punish in eternal flames an unbaptized child were
considered infamous.
As soon as our ancestors began to get free they began to enslave others.
With an inconsistency that defies explanation, they practiced upon others
the same outrages that had been perpetrated upon them. As soon as white
slavery began to be abolished, black slavery commenced. In this infamous
traffic nearly every nation of Europe embarked. Fortunes were quickly
realized; the avarice and cupidity of Europe were excited; all ideas of
justice were discarded; pity fled from the human breast a few good, brave
men recited the horrors of the trade; avarice was deaf; religion refused to
hear; the trade went on; the governments of Europe upheld it in the name of
commerce -- in the name of civilization and religion.
Our fathers knew the history of caste. They knew that in the despotisms of
the Old World it a was disgrace to be useful. They knew that a mechanic was
esteemed as hardly the equal of a hound, and far below a blooded horse.
They knew that a nobleman held a son of labor in contempt -- that he had no
rights the royal loafers were bound to respect.
The world has changed.
The other day there came shoemakers, potters, workers in wood and iron,
from Europe, and they were received in the city of New York as though they
had been princes. They had been sent by the great republic of France to
examine into the arts and manufactures of the great republic of America.
They looked a thousand times better to me than the Edward Alberts and
Albert Edwards -- the royal vermin, that live on the body politic. And I
would think much more of our Government if it would fete and feast them,
instead of wining and dining the imbeciles of a royal line.
Our fathers devoted their lives and fortunes to the grand work of founding
a government for the protection of the rights of man. The theological idea
as to the source of political power had poisoned the web and woof of every
government in the world, and our fathers banished it from this continent
forever.
What we want to-day is what our fathers wrote down. They did not attain to
their ideal; we approach it nearer, but have not reached it yet. We want,
not only the independence of a State, not only the independence of a
nation, but something far more glorious -- the absolute independence of the
individual. That is what we want. I want it so that I, one of the children
of Nature, can stand on an equality with the rest; that I can say this is
MY air, MY sunshine, MY earth, and I have a right to live, and hope and
aspire, and labor, and enjoy the fruit of that labor, as much as any
individual or any nation on the face of the globe.
We want every American to make to-day, on this hundredth anniversary, a
declaration of individual independence. Let each man enjoy his liberty to
the utmost enjoy all he can; but be sure it is not at the expense of
another. The French Convention gave the best definition of liberty I have
ever read: "The liberty of one citizen ceases only where the liberty of
another citizen commences." I know of no better definition. I ask you
to-day to make a declaration of individual independence. And if you are
independent be just. Allow everybody else to make his declaration of
individual independence Allow your wife, allow your husband, allow your
children to make theirs. Let everybody be absolutely free and independent,
knowing only the sacred obligations of honesty and affection. Let us be
independent of party, independent of everybody and everything except our
own consciences and our own brains. Do not belong to any clique. Have clear
title-deeds in fee simple to yourselves, without any mortgages on the
premises to anybody in the world.
It is a grand thing to be the owner of yourself. It is a grand thing to
protect the rights of others. It is a sublime thing to be free and just.
Only a few days ago I stood in Independence Hall -- in that little room
where was signed the immortal paper. A little room, like any other; and it
did not seem possible that from that room went forth ideas, like cherubim
and seraphim, spreading heir wings over a continent, and touching, as with
holy fire, the hearts of men.
In a few moments I was in the park, where are gathered the accomplishment
of a century. Our fathers never dreamed of the things I saw. There were
hundreds of locomotives, with their nerves of steel and breath of flame --
every kind of machine, with whirling wheels and curious cogs and cranks,
and the myriad thoughts of men that have been wrought in iron, brass and
steel. And going out from one little building were wires in the air,
stretching to every civilized nation, and they could send a shining
messenger in a moment to any part of the world, and it would go sweeping
under the waves of the sea with thoughts and words within its glowing
heart. I saw all that had been achieved by this nation, and I wished that
the signers of the Declaration -- the soldiers of the Revolution -- could
see what a century of freedom has produced. I wished they could see the
fields we cultivate -- the rivers we navigate -- the railroads running over
the Alleghanies, far into what was then the unknown forest -- on over the
broad prairies -- on over the vast plains -- away over the mountains of the
West, to the Golden Gate of the Pacific. All this is the result of a
hundred years of freedom.
Are you not more than glad that in 1776 was announced the sublime principle
that political power resides with the people? That our fathers then made up
their minds nevermore to be colonists and subjects, but that they would be
free and independent citizens of America?
I will not name any of the grand men who fought for liberty. All should be
named, or none. I feel that the unknown soldier who was shot down without
even his name being remembered -- who was included only in a report of "a
hundred killed," or "a hundred missing," nobody knowing even the number
that attached to his august corpse -- is entitled to as deep and heartfelt
thanks as the titled leader who fell at the head of the host.
Standing here amid the sacred memories of the first, on the golden
threshold of the second, I ask, Will the second century be as grand as the
first? I believe it will, because we are growing more and humane. I believe
there is more human kindness, more real, sweet human sympathy, a greater
desire to help one another, in the United States, than in all the world
besides.
We must progress. We are just at the commencement of invention. The steam
engine -- the telegraph -- these are but the toys with which science has
been amused. Wait; there will be grander things, there will be wider and
higher culture -- a grander standard of character, of literature and art.
We have now half as many millions of people as we have years, and many of
us will live until a hundred millions stand beneath the flag. We are
getting more real solid sense. The schoolhouse is the finest building in
the village. We are writing and reading more books; we are painting and
buying more pictures; we are struggling more and more to get at the
philosophy of life, of things -- trying more and more to answer the
questions of the eternal Sphinx. We are looking in every direction --
investigating; in short, we are thinking and working. Besides all this, I
believe the people are nearer honest than ever before. A few rears ago we
were willing to live upon the labor of four million slaves. Was that
honest? At last, we have a national conscience. At last, we have carried
out the Declaration of Independence. Our fathers wrote it -- we have
accomplished it. The black man was a slave -- we made him a citizen. We
found four million human beings in manacles, and now the hands of a race
are held up in the free air without a chain.
I have had the supreme pleasure of seeing a man -- once a slave -- sitting
in the seat of his former master in the Congress of the United States. I
have had that pleasure, and when I saw it my eyes were filled with tears. I
felt that we had carried out the Declaration of Independence -- that we had
given reality to it, and breathed the breath of life into its every word. I
felt that our flag would float over and protect the colored man and his
little children, standing straight in the sun, just the same as though he
were white and worth a million. I would protect him more, because the rich
white man could protect himself.
All who stand beneath our banner are free. Ours is the only flag that has
in reality written upon it: Liberty, Fraternity, Equality -- the three
grandest words in all the languages of men.
Liberty: Give to every man the fruit of his own labor -- the labor of his
hands and of his brain.
Fraternity: Every man in the right is my brother.
Equality: The rights of all are equal: justice, poised and balanced in
eternal calm, will shake from the golden scales in which are weighed the
acts of men, the very dust of prejudice and caste: No race, no color, no
previous condition, can change the rights of men.
The Declaration of Independence has at last been carried out in letter and
in spirit.
The second century will be grander than the first.
Fifty millions of people are celebrating this day. To-day, the black man
looks upon his child and says: The avenues to distinction are open to you
-- upon your brow may fall the civic wreath -- this day belongs to you.
We are celebrating the courage and wisdom of our fathers, and the glad
shout of a free people the anthem of a grand nation, commencing at the
Atlantic, is following the sun to the Pacific, across a continent of happy
homes.
We are a great people. Three millions have increased to fifty -- thirteen
States to thirty-eight. We have better homes, better clothes, better food
and more of it, and more of the conveniences of life, than any other people
upon the globe.
The farmers of our country live better than did the kings and princes two
hundred years ago -- and they have twice as much sense and heart. Liberty
and labor have given us all. I want every person here to believe in the
dignity of labor -- to know that the respectable man is the useful man --
the man who produces or helps others to produce something of value, whether
thought of the brain or work of the hand.
I want you to go away with an eternal hatred in your breast of injustice,
of aristocracy, of caste, of the idea that one man has more rights than
another because he has better clothes, more land, more money, because he
owns a railroad, or is famous and in high position. Remember that all men
have equal rights. Remember that the man who acts best his part -- who
loves his friends the best -- is most willing to help others -- truest to
the discharge of obligation -- who has the best heart -- the most feeling
-- the deepest sympathies -- and who freely gives to others the rights that
he claims for himself is the best man. I am willing to swear to this.
What has made this country? I say again, liberty and labor. What would we
be without labor? I want every farmer when plowing the rustling corn of
June -- while mowing in the perfumed fields -- to feel that he is adding to
the wealth and glory of the United States. I want every mechanic -- every
man of toil, to know and feel that he is keeping the cars running, the
telegraph wires in the air; that he is making the statues and painting the
pictures; that he is writing and printing the books; that he is helping to
fill the world with honor, with happiness, with love and law.
Our country is founded upon the dignity of labor -- upon the equality of
man. Ours is the first real Republic in the history of the world. Beneath
our flag the people are free. We have retired the gods from politics. We
have found that man is the only source of political power, and that the
governed should govern. We have disfranchised the aristocrats of the air
and have given one country to mankind.
Bank Of Wisdom
The Bank Of Wisdom is run by Emmet Fields out of his home in Kentucky. He
painstakingly scanned in these works and put them on disks for others to
have available. Mr. Fields makes these disks available for only the cost of
the media.
Files made available from the Bank Of Wisdom may be freely reproduced and
given away, but may not be sold.
Reproducable Electronic Publishing can defeat censorship.
The Bank of Wisdom is a collection of the most thoughtful, scholarly and
factual books. These computer books are reprints of suppressed books and
will cover American and world history; the Biographies and writings of
famous persons, and especially of our nations Founding Fathers. They will
include philosophy and religion. all these subjects, and more, will be made
available to the public in electronic form, easily copied and distributed,
so that America can again become what its Founders intended --
The Free Market-Place of Ideas.
The Bank of Wisdom is always looking for more of these old, hidden,
suppressed and forgotten books that contain needed facts and information
for today. If you have such books please contact us, we need to give them
back to America.
Bank of Wisdom,
Box 926,
Louisville, KY 40201
.
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