A fair young girl, with light and delicate limbs,
And wavy tresses gushing from the cap
With which the Roman master crowned his slave
When he took off the gyves. A bearded man,
Armed to the teeth, art thou; one mailèd hand
Grasps the broad shield, and one the sword; thy brow,
Glorious in beauty though it be, is scarred
With tokens of old wars; thy massive limbs
Are strong with struggling. Power at thee has launched
His bolts, and with his lightnings smitten thee;
They could not quench the life thou hast from heaven;
Merciless Power has dug thy dungeon deep,
And his swart armorers, by a thousand fires,
Have forged thy chain; yet, while he deems thee bound,
The links are shivered, and the prison walls
Fall outward; terribly thou springest forth,
As springs the flame above a burning pile,
And shoutest to the nations, who return
Thy shoutings, while the pale oppressor flies.
Thy birthright was not given by human hands:
Thou wert twin-born with man. In pleasant fields,
While yet our race was few, thou sat’st with him,
To tend the quiet flock and watch the stars,
And teach the reed to utter simple airs.
Thou by his side, amid the tangled wood,
Didst war upon the panther and the wolf,
His only foes; and thou with him didst draw
The earliest furrow on the mountain’s side,
Soft with the deluge. Tyranny himself,
Thy enemy, although of reverend look,
Hoary with many years, and far obeyed,
Is later born than thou; and as he meets
The grave defiance of thine elder eye,
The usurper trembles in his fastnesses.
Thou shalt wax stronger with the lapse of years,
But he shall fade into a feebler age—
Feebler, yet subtler. He shall weave his snares,
And spring them on thy careless steps, and clap
His withered hands, and from their ambush call
His hordes to fall upon thee. He shall send
Quaint maskers, wearing fair and gallant forms
To catch thy gaze, and uttering graceful words
To charm they ear; while his sly imps, by stealth,
Twine round thee threads of steel, light thread on thread,
That grow to fetters; or bind down thy arms
With chains concealed in chaplets. Oh! not yet
Mayst thou unbrace thy corselet, nor lay by
Thy sword; nor yet, O Freedom! close thy lids
In slumber; for thine enemy never sleeps,
And thou must watch and combat till the day
Of the new earth and heaven.
AMERICA
BY WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT
Oh, mother of a mighty race,
Yet lovely in thy youthful grace!
The elder dames, thy haughty peers,
Admire and hate thy blooming years.
With words of shame
And taunts of scorn they join thy name.
For on thy cheeks the glow is spread
That tints thy morning hills with red;
Thy step—the wild deer’s rustling feet
Within thy woods are not more fleet;
Thy hopeful eye
Is bright as thine own sunny sky.
Aye, let them rail—those haughty ones,
While safe thou dwellest with thy sons.
They do not know how loved thou art,
How many a fond and fearless heart
Would rise to throw
Its life between thee and the foe.
They know not, in their hate and pride,
What virtues with thy children bide;
How true, how good, thy graceful maids
Make bright, like flowers, the valley shades;
What generous men
Spring, like thine oaks, by hill and glen;—
What cordial welcomes greet the guest
By thy lone rivers of the West;
How faith is kept, and truth revered,
And man is loved, and God is feared,
In woodland homes,
And where the ocean border foams.
There’s freedom at thy gates and rest
For Earth’s down-trodden and opprest,
A shelter for the hunted head,
For the starved laborer toil and bread.
Power, at thy bounds,
Stops and calls back his baffled hounds.
Oh, fair young mother! on thy brow
Shall sit a nobler grace than now.
Deep in the brightness of the skies
The thronging years in glory rise,
And, as they fleet,
Drop strength and riches at thy feet.
Thine eye, with every coming hour,
Shall brighten, and thy form shall tower;
And when thy sisters, elder born,
Would brand thy name with words of scorn,
Before thine eye,
Upon their lips the taunt shall die.
ODE
BY RALPH WALDO EMERSON
(Sung in the Town Hall, Concord, July 4, 1857.)
O tenderly the haughty day
Fills his blue urn with fire;
One morn is in the mighty heaven,
And one in our desire.
The cannon booms from town to town,
Our pulses beat not less,
The joy-bells chime their tidings down,
Which children’s voices bless.
For He that flung the broad blue fold
O’er-mantling land and sea,
One third part of the sky unrolled
For the banner of the free.
The men are ripe of Saxon kind
To build an equal state,—
To take the statute from the mind
And make of duty fate.
United States! the ages plead,—
Present and Past in under-song,—
Go put your creed into your deed,
Nor speak with double tongue.
For sea and land don’t understand
Nor skies without a frown
See rights for which the one hand fights
By the other cloven down.
Be just at home; then write your scroll
Of honor o’er the sea,
And bid the broad Atlantic roll
A ferry of the free.
And henceforth there shall be no chain,
Save underneath the sea
The wires shall murmur through the main
Sweet songs of liberty.
The conscious stars accord above,
The waters wild below,
And under, through the cable wove,
Her fiery errands go.
AMERICA FIRST[12]
ANONYMOUS
This is the season when Young America celebrates the glorious deeds of
the forefathers, when they cut the leading-strings that bound them to the
Old World, and stepped forth with the independence of manhood.
It took Rome five hundred years, five centuries of war, intrigue
and arrogance, to overspread Southern Europe. In a little more than
one century America has grown to a magnitude in area and perhaps in
population also, equal to that of Rome in its most magnificent days.
“_Civis Romanus sum!_” was the proudest boast that could fall from the
lips of man at the beginning of the Christian era. Is there to-day an
American who rates his citizenship in the Great Republic at a lower value
than Roman freedom nineteen hundred years ago?
The day for “spread-eagle” brag is long past, but there is no reason
why we should hesitate to say what not we alone but all the people of
the world believe, that it is the destiny of this country to become the
greatest, the strongest, the wealthiest, the most self-supporting of
all the nations of the earth. It is already the greatest self-governing
community the world has ever seen.
How can we make it greater? By standing together as Americans. We shall
not magnify, but shall belittle ourselves, if we swagger before our
neighbors—using bravado for the strong, and insolence in our treatment
of the weak. But we should take American views instead of party views,
when questions arise between this government and others.
The motto “America against the world” would be a contemptible motto. Yet
is it not better to adopt even such a motto than to take the side of the
world against America, or to be indifferent when the interests of one’s
own country are assailed?
The Fourth of July is a good time for us all to resolve that we will be
Americans at heart. Not that we will build up our own country on the
ruins of others, but that when there is a clashing of interests those of
our native land shall have our hearty support.
LIBERTY FOR ALL
BY WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON
They tell me, Liberty! that in thy name
I may not plead for all the human race;
That some are born to bondage and disgrace,
Some to a heritage of woe and shame,
And some to power supreme, and glorious fame:
With my whole soul I spurn the doctrine base,
And, as an equal brotherhood, embrace
All people, and for all fair freedom claim!
Know this, O man! whate’er thy earthly fate—
God never made a tyrant nor a slave:
Woe, then, to those who dare to desecrate
His glorious image!—for to all He gave
Eternal rights, which none may violate;
And, by a mighty hand, the oppressed He yet shall save!
HYMN
(For the Fourth of July, 1863.)
ANONYMOUS
Lord, the people of the land
In Thy presence humbly stand;
On this day, when Thou didst free
Men of old from tyranny,
We, their children, bow to Thee.
Help us, Lord, our only trust!
We are helpless, we are dust!
All our homes are red with blood;
Long our grief we have withstood;
Every lintel, each door-post,
Drips, at tidings from the host,
With the blood of some one lost.
Help us, Lord, our only trust!
We are helpless, we are dust!
Comfort, Lord, the grieving one
Who bewails a stricken son!
Comfort, Lord, the weeping wife,
In her long, long widowed life,
Brooding o’er the fatal strife,
Help us, Lord, our only trust!
We are helpless, we are dust!
On our Nation’s day of birth,
Bless Thy own long-favored earth!
Urge the soldier with Thy will!
Aid their leaders with Thy skill!
Let them hear Thy trumpet thrill!
Help us, Lord, our only trust!
We are helpless, we are dust!
Lord, we only fight for peace,
Fight that freedom may increase.
Give us back the peace of old,
When the land with plenty rolled,
And our banner awed the bold!
Help us, Lord, our only trust!
We are helpless, we are dust!
Lest we pray in thoughtless guilt,
Shape the future as Thou wilt!
Purge our realm from hoary crime
With Thy battles, dread, sublime,
In Thy well-appointed time!
Help us, Lord, our only trust!
We are helpless, we are dust!
With one heart the Nation’s cries
From our choral lips arise:
Thou didst point a noble way
For our Fathers through the fray;
Lead their children thus to-day!
Help us, Lord, our only trust!
We are helpless, we are dust!
In His name, who bravely bore
Cross and crown begemmed with gore,
By His last immortal groan,
Ere He mounted to His throne,
Make our sacred cause Thy own!
Help us, Lord, our only trust!
We are helpless, we are dust!
THE DAWNING FUTURE
BY WILLIAM PRESTON JOHNSON, PRESIDENT OF TULANE UNIVERSITY, LA.
(Closing stanza of patriotic poem, “The Patriot South.”)
Thus, in the march of time, and long procession
Of coming ages, year on year,
We mark the great Republic’s proud career,
Like Philip’s phalanx, manifold,
With bucklers linked, one front against aggression,
Till Freedom’s perfect vision is unrolled,
And man, with eye unsealed, its glories shall behold.
LIBERTY
The people never give up their liberties but under some delusion.
BURKE—_Speech at a County Meeting at Bucks, 1784._
Liberty’s in every blow!
Let us do or die.
BURNS—_Bannockburn._
What is liberty without wisdom and without virtue? It is the greatest of
all possible evils; for it is folly, vice, and madness, without tuition
or restraint.
BURKE—_Reflections on the Revolution in France._
The poorest man may in his cottage bid defiance to all the force of the
crown.
EARL OF CHATHAM—_Speech on the Excise Bill._
’Tis liberty alone that gives the flower
Of fleeting life its luster and perfume;
And we are weeds without it.
COWPER—_The Task._ Bk. V. Line 446.
The love of liberty with life is given,
And life itself the inferior gift of heaven.
DRYDEN—_Palamon and Arcite._ Bk. II. Line 291.
This is true liberty when freeborn men,
Having to advise the public, may speak free:
Which he who can and will deserves high praise:
Who neither can nor will may hold his peace.
What can be juster in a state than this?
MILTON—Trans. _Horace._ Ep. i. 16, 40.
Give me again my hollow tree
A crust of bread, and liberty!
POPE—_Imitations of Horace._ Bk. II. Satire VI. Line 220.
O Liberty! Liberty! how many crimes are committed in thy name!
MADAME ROLAND—_Macaulay._ _Mirabeau._
FREEDOM
Hereditary bondsmen! Know ye not
Who would be free themselves must strike the blow?
BYRON—_Childe Harold._ Canto II. St. 67.
Freedom has a thousand charms to show,
That slaves howe’er contented, never know.
COWPER—_Table Talk._ Line 260.
He is the freeman, whom the truth makes free,
And all are slaves besides.
COWPER—_The Task._ Bk. V. Line 733.
When Freedom from her mountain height
Unfurled her standard to the air,
She tore the azure robe of night,
And set the stars of glory there.
DRAKE—_The American Flag._
My angel—his name is Freedom,—
Choose him to be your king;
He shall cut pathways east and west,
And fend you with his wing.
EMERSON—_Boston Hymn._
Yes, to this thought I hold with firm persistence;
The last result of wisdom stamps it true;
He only earns his freedom and existence
Who daily conquers them anew.
GOETHE—_Faust._
Know ye why the Cypress tree as Freedom’s tree is known?
Know ye why the Lily fair as Freedom’s flower is shown?
Hundred arms the Cypress has, yet never plunder seeks;
With ten well-developed tongues the Lily never speaks!
OMAR KHAYYAM—Frederich Bodenstedt, Translator.
What is freedom? Rightly understood,
A universal license to be good.
HARTLEY COLERIDGE.
A RHAPSODY
BY CASSIUS MARCELLUS CLAY
I may be an enthusiast; but I cannot but give utterance to the
conceptions of my own mind. When I look upon the special developments
of European civilization; when I contemplate the growing freedom of the
cities, and the middle class which has sprung up between the pretenders
to divine rule on the one hand, and the abject serf on the other; when
I consider the Reformation, and the invention of the press, and see, on
the southern shore of the continent, an humble individual, amidst untold
difficulties and repeated defeats, pursuing the mysterious suggestions
which the mighty deep poured unceasingly upon his troubled spirit, till
at last, with great and irrepressible energy of soul, he discovered that
there lay in the far western ocean a continent open for the infusion of
those elementary principles of liberty which were dwarfed in European
soil,—I conceive that the hand of destiny was there!
When I see the immigration of the Pilgrims from the chalky shores of
England,—in the night fleeing from their native home,—so dramatically
and ably pictured by Mr. Webster in his celebrated oration,—when father,
mother, brother, wife, sister, lover, were all lost by those melancholy
wanderers—“stifling,” in the language of one who is immortal in the
conception, “the mighty hunger of the heart,” and landing, amidst cold
and poverty and death, upon the rude rocks of Plymouth,—I venture to
think the will of Deity was there!
When I have remembered the Revolution of ’76,—the Seven Years’ War—three
millions of men in arms against the most powerful nation in history, and
vindicating their independence,—I have thought that their sufferings and
death were not in vain! When I have seen the forsaken hearthstone,—looked
upon the battle-field, upon the dying and the dead,—heard the agonizing
cry, “Water, for the sake of God! water;” seeing the dissolution of
being—pale lips pressing in death the yet loved images of wife, sister,
lover,—I have not deemed—I will not deem all these things in vain! I
cannot regard this great continent, reaching from the Atlantic to the far
Pacific, and from the St. John’s to the Rio del Norte, as the destined
home of a barbarian people of third-rate civilization.
Like the Roman who looked back upon the glory of his ancestors, in woe,
exclaiming,
“Great Scipio’s ghost complains that we are slow,
And Pompey’s shade walks unavenged among us,”
the great dead hover around me:—Lawrence, “Don’t give up the
ship.”—Henry, “Give me liberty or give me death!”—Adams, “Survive or
perish, I am for the Declaration.”—Allan, “In the name of the living God,
I come!”
Come then, Thou Eternal, who dwellest not in temples made with hands, but
who, in the city’s crowd or by the far forest stream, revealest Thyself
to the earnest seeker after the true and right, inspire my heart; give
me undying courage to pursue the promptings of my spirit; and whether I
shall be called in the shades of life to look upon as sweet and kind and
lovely faces as now, or shut in by sorrow and night, horrid visions shall
gloom upon me in my dying hour, O my country, mayest thou yet be free!
COLUMBIA
BY FREDERICK LAWRENCE KNOWLES
Mated to the Millennium,—Time’s last heir
And proudest daughter, conquerless as he;
Girdled with lakes like jewels princely fair,
With strong feet planted in the Mexic sea!
Where Law is liberty, where Love is power,
And the twain one, there Treason cannot dwell;
A fangless asp, it coiled one impotent hour,
But at thy white glance backward writhed to hell.
Leave dotard empires flames of drunken war,
Be thine chaste hours of labor and increase,
Vineyards and harvests yielding guiltless store,
Toil’s bloodless battles on the plains of peace!
Yet when slain Weakness, dying at thy door,
Summoning thy right arm’s vengeance, clasps thy feet,—
Thy sword that drinks her murderer’s blood is pure
As laughing sickles in the saffron wheat.
Clearing a crimson path where Peace may tread
More safely; thou dost play thy patient part,
Love’s pledged ally,—yea, though thy blade be red;
Thrusting War’s weapons thro’ his own false heart.
O goddess, arctic-crowned and tropic-shod
And belted with great waters, hear our cry,—
More honest never reached the ear of God,—
We’ll serve thee, laud thee, love thee, till we die!
A RENAISSANCE OF PATRIOTISM[13]
BY GEORGE J. MANSON
A RENAISSANCE
Within the past few years there has been what ex-President Harrison
once happily termed “a renaissance of patriotism.” It started with the
centennial anniversaries of 1776, which had the effect of carrying the
memories of the people back to the period of the Nation’s birth, and
subsequently resulted in the formation of several societies which will
be the means of fostering the patriotic spirit and love of country,
and recall remembrances of our Revolutionary struggle. The organizers
of these societies found that there was a growing lack of what may be
called national patriotism—the patriotism that grows out of a lively
recollection of the early making of the country through battle, toil,
and hardship of the fathers. This lukewarm spirit was not charged to
the flood of immigration, or to the lapse of time, but was principally
due to neglect on the part of the descendants of Revolutionary heroes
to perform their duty of keeping before the public mind the memory of
the services of their ancestors, the times in which they lived and the
principles for which they contended.
THE SONS OF THE REVOLUTION
One of the first of these societies to be started was the “Sons of the
Revolution.” This was organized February 22, 1876, reorganized December
4, 1883, and incorporated May 3, 1884. The aim of this society is to
perpetuate the memory of the men who, in military, naval or civil
service, by their acts or counsel, achieved American independence. The
members promote and assist in the proper celebration of the anniversaries
of Washington’s Birthday, the battles of Lexington and Bunker Hill,
the Fourth of July, the capitulation of Saratoga and Yorktown, and the
formal evacuation of New York by the British army, December 3, 1783, as
a relinquishment of territorial sovereignty, and other prominent events
relating to or connected with the War of the Revolution.
The roll-book of the members is something more than a mere list of
names. Before each name is the year, showing when the member was
admitted into the society, and there is also given in a paragraph his
genealogical history so far as it relates to his ancestors who were in
any way connected with the Revolutionary struggle. There is a general,
or national society, divided into state societies which regulate their
own affairs. Under the rules of the New York State society, ten or more
members can organize within any county outside of the county of New York,
such a body being called a local chapter. The total membership is now
about six thousand. When membership is asked on the ground of an ancestor
having been a “sailor” or “marine,” it must be shown that such service
was other than shore duty and regularly performed in the Continental
navy, or the navy of one of the original thirteen states, or on an
armed vessel other than a merchant ship. When the ancestor has been an
“official” his service must have been sufficiently important in character
to have rendered him specially liable to arrest and imprisonment, if
captured by the enemy, as well as liable to conviction of treason against
the Government of Great Britain.
A few years ago the society stimulated interest in its work by offering
two prizes to the cadets of the United States Naval Academy, at
Annapolis, Md.,—a gold medal and a silver medal—for the best original
essays upon the subject, “The Navy of the Revolution.” A singular and
patriotic feature of these essays was that they were not to contain less
than 1,776 words. A gold medal is likewise annually awarded by the New
York society to a student in the College of the City of New York, for the
best essay on a patriotic subject, and gold, silver, and bronze medals to
the scholars of the high schools throughout the State for like essays.
Similar prizes are awarded by the societies in other states.
Congress has also been urged, by the Sons of the Revolution as a body,
to pass a bill which has already been introduced in that body, making an
appropriation of a sum of money to erect a monument to John Paul Jones.
It has also memorialized Congress to enact such a law as will secure the
publication of all the archives of the United States Government relating
to the War of the Revolution, in a manner similar to the publication of
the records of the War of the Rebellion.
The seal of the society is an interesting study, suggesting as it
does, in small compass, the spirit of patriotism the society desires
to cultivate. The seal consists of the figure of a minute-man, in
Continental uniform, standing on a ladder leading to a belfry. In his
right hand he holds a musket and an olive branch, while his left hand
grasps a bell-rope. Above is seen the cracked Liberty bell, from which
issues a ribbon bearing the motto of the society: _Exegi monumentum aere
perennius_. Many members of this society did gallant service in the war
with Spain.
SONS OF THE AMERICAN REVOLUTION
The second important patriotic society is the “Sons of the American
Revolution,” a name very similar to that of the organization just
mentioned. The first branch of this society was formed in California in
1876 by a body of descendants of officers, soldiers, and seamen of the
Revolution gathered in San Francisco for the purpose of celebrating the
one hundredth anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Similar
societies were therefore organized in other states and, on April 30,
1889, these societies with two or three exceptions celebrated the
centennial inauguration of Washington as first President of the United
States. This meeting was held in Fraunce’s Tavern, in New York City, in
the identical long room (now marked with a commemorative tablet) in which
Washington bade farewell to his officers, December 3, 1783. The national
organization was formed on the occasion of this meeting.
This society exists in about thirty states, and numbers about five
thousand members. A singular and interesting feature in connection with
this and kindred organizations is that their existence has led to and
greatly stimulated genealogical research, a species of investigation to
which Americans, as a rule, have given but little attention. Persons
who have become interested in these societies, it has been found, have
rescued unrecorded facts from the aged members of their families who were
destined soon to pass away, information which could have been obtained in
no other way and which would have been lost forever in a few years.