places, some proof that we hold the blessings transmitted from our
fathers in just estimation; some proof of our attachment to the cause of
good government, and of civil and religious liberty; some proof of a
sincere and ardent desire to promote everything which may enlarge the
understandings and improve the hearts of men. And when, from the long
distance of a hundred years, they shall look back upon us, they shall
know, at least, that we possessed affections which, running backward and
warming with gratitude for what our ancestors have done for our
happiness, run forward also to our posterity, and meet them with cordial
salutation, ere yet they have arrived on the shore of being.
Advance, then, ye future generations! We would hail you, as you rise in
your long succession, to fill the places which we now fill, and to taste
the blessings of existence where we are passing, and soon shall have
passed, our own human duration. We bid you welcome to this pleasant land
of the fathers. We bid you welcome to the healthful skies and the
verdant fields of New England. We greet your accession to the great
inheritance which we have enjoyed. We welcome you to the blessings of
good government and religious liberty. We welcome you to the treasures
of science and the delights of learning. We welcome you to the
transcendent sweets of domestic life, to the happiness of kindred and
parents and children. We welcome you to the immeasurable blessings of
rational existence, the immortal hope of Christianity, and the light of
everlasting truth!
THE BUNKER HILL MONUMENT
AN ADDRESS DELIVERED AT THE LAYING OF THE CORNER-STONE AT CHARLESTOWN,
MASSACHUSETTS, JUNE 17, 1825[7]
This uncounted multitude before me and around me proves the feeling
which the occasion has excited. These thousands of human faces, glowing
with sympathy and joy, and from the impulses of a common gratitude
turned reverently to heaven in this spacious temple of the firmament,
proclaim that the day, the place, and the purpose of our assembling have
made a deep impression on our hearts.
[Illustration: THE BATTLE OF BUNKER HILL]
[Sidenote: The Battle of Bunker Hill, June 17, 1775.]
If, indeed, there be anything in local association fit to affect the
mind of man, we need not strive to repress the emotions which agitate us
here. We are among the sepulchres of our fathers. We are on ground
distinguished by their valor, their constancy, and the shedding of their
blood. We are here, not to fix an uncertain date in our annals, nor to
draw into notice an obscure and unknown spot. If our humble purpose had
never been conceived, if we ourselves had never been born, the 17th
of June, 1775, would have been a day on which all subsequent history
would have poured its light, and the eminence where we stand a point of
attraction to the eyes of successive generations. But we are Americans.
We live in what may be called the early age of this great continent; and
we know that our posterity, through all time, are here to enjoy and
suffer the allotments of humanity. We see before us a probable train of
great events; we know that our own fortunes have been happily cast; and
it is natural, therefore, that we should be moved by the contemplation
of occurrences which have guided our destiny before many of us were
born, and settled the condition in which we should pass that portion of
our existence which God allows to men on earth.
[Sidenote: The discovery of America.]
We do not read even of the discovery of this continent, without feeling
something of a personal interest in the event; without being reminded
how much it has affected our own fortunes and our own existence. It
would be still more unnatural for us, therefore, than for others, to
contemplate with unaffected minds that interesting, I may say that most
touching and pathetic scene, when the great discoverer of America stood
on the deck of his shattered bark, the shades of night falling on the
sea, yet no man sleeping; tossed on the billows of an unknown ocean, yet
the stronger billows of alternate hope and despair tossing his own
troubled thoughts; extending forward his harassed frame, straining
westward his anxious and eager eyes, till Heaven at last granted him a
moment of rapture and ecstasy, in blessing his vision with the sight of
the unknown world.
[Sidenote: The first settlement of New England.]
Nearer to our times, more closely connected with our fates, and
therefore still more interesting to our feelings and affections, is the
settlement of our own country by colonists from England. We cherish
every memorial of these worthy ancestors; we celebrate their patience
and fortitude; we admire their daring enterprise; we teach our children
to venerate their piety; and we are justly proud of being descended from
men who have set the world an example of founding civil institutions on
the great and united principles of human freedom and human knowledge. To
us, their children, the story of their labors and sufferings can never
be without its interest. We shall not stand unmoved on the shore of
Plymouth, while the sea continues to wash it; nor will our brethren in
another early and ancient colony forget the place of its first
establishment, till their river shall cease to flow by it.[8] No vigor
of youth, no maturity of manhood, will lead the nation to forget the
spots where its infancy was cradled and defended.
[Sidenote: The American Revolution.]
But the great event in the history of the continent, which we are now
met here to commemorate, that prodigy of modern times, at once the
wonder and the blessing of the world, is the American Revolution. In a
day of extraordinary prosperity and happiness, of high national honor,
distinction, and power, we are brought together, in this place, by our
love of country, by our admiration of exalted character, by our
gratitude for signal services and patriotic devotion.
[Sidenote: The object of the monument.]
The Society whose organ I am was formed for the purpose of rearing some
honorable and durable monument to the memory of the early friends of
American Independence. They have thought that for this object no time
could be more propitious than the present prosperous and peaceful
period, that no place could claim preference over this memorable spot,
and that no day could be more auspicious to the undertaking than the
anniversary of the battle which was here fought. The foundation of that
monument we have now laid. With solemnities suited to the occasion, with
prayers to Almighty God for his blessing, and in the midst of this cloud
of witnesses, we have begun the work. We trust it will be prosecuted,
and that, springing from a broad foundation, rising high in massive
solidity and unadorned grandeur, it may remain as long as Heaven permits
the works of man to last, a fit emblem, both of the events in memory of
which it is raised, and of the gratitude of those who have reared it.
We know, indeed, that the record of illustrious actions is most safely
deposited in the universal remembrance of mankind. We know that if we
could cause this structure to ascend, not only till it reached the
skies, but till it pierced them, its broad surfaces could still contain
but part of that which, in an age of knowledge, hath already been spread
over the earth, and which history charges itself with making known to
all future times. We know that no inscription on entablatures less broad
than the earth itself can carry information of the events we commemorate
where it has not already gone; and that no structure which shall not
outlive the duration of letters and knowledge among men can prolong the
memorial. But our object is, by this edifice, to show our own deep sense
of the value and importance of the achievements of our ancestors; and,
by presenting this work of gratitude to the eye, to keep alive similar
sentiments, and to foster a constant regard for the principles of the
Revolution. Human beings are composed, not of reason only, but of
imagination also, and sentiment; and that is neither wasted nor
misapplied which is appropriated to the purpose of giving right
direction to sentiments, and opening proper springs of feeling in the
heart.
[Sidenote: Importance of the site.]
Let it not be supposed that our object is to perpetuate national
hostility, or even to cherish a mere military spirit. It is higher,
purer, nobler. We consecrate our work to the spirit of national
independence, and we wish that the light of peace may rest upon it
forever. We rear a memorial of our conviction of that unmeasured benefit
which has been conferred on our own land, and of the happy influences
which have been produced, by the same events, on the general interests
of mankind. We come, as Americans, to mark a spot which must forever be
dear to us and our posterity. We wish that whosoever, in all coming
time, shall turn his eye hither, may behold that the place is not
undistinguished where the first great battle of the Revolution was
fought. We wish that this structure may proclaim the magnitude and
importance of that event to every class and every age. We wish that
infancy may learn the purpose of its erection from maternal lips, and
that weary and withered age may behold it, and be solaced by the
recollections which it suggests. We wish that labor may look up here,
and be proud in the midst of its toil. We wish that, in those days of
disaster which, as they come upon all nations, must be expected to come
upon us also, desponding patriotism may turn its eyes hitherward, and be
assured that the foundations of our national power are still strong. We
wish that this column, rising towards heaven among the pointed spires of
so many temples dedicated to God, may contribute also to produce, in all
minds, a pious feeling of dependence and gratitude. We wish, finally,
that the last object to the sight of him who leaves his native shore,
and the first to gladden his who revisits it, may be something which
shall remind him of the liberty and the glory of his country. Let it
rise! let it rise, till it meet the sun in his coming; let the earliest
light of the morning gild it, and parting day linger and play on its
summit.
[Sidenote: The survivors of 1775.]
We still have among us some of those who were active agents in the
scenes of 1775, and who are now here, from every quarter of New England,
to visit once more, and under circumstances so affecting, I had almost
said so overwhelming, this renowned theatre of their courage and
patriotism.
Venerable men! you have come down to us from a former generation. Heaven
has bounteously lengthened out your lives, that you might behold this
joyous day. You are now where you stood fifty years ago, this very hour,
with your brothers and your neighbors, shoulder to shoulder, in the
strife for your country. Behold, how altered! The same heavens are
indeed over your heads; the same ocean rolls at your feet; but all else
how changed! You hear now no roar of hostile cannon, you see no mixed
volumes of smoke and flame rising from burning Charlestown. The ground
strewed with the dead and the dying; the impetuous charge; the steady
and successful repulse; the loud call to repeated assault; the summoning
of all that is manly to repeated resistance; a thousand bosoms freely
and fearlessly bared in an instant to whatever of terror there may be in
war and death,--all these you have witnessed, but you witness them no
more. All is peace. The heights of yonder metropolis, its towers and
roofs, which you then saw filled with wives and children and countrymen
in distress and terror, and looking with unutterable emotions for the
issue of the combat, have presented you to-day with the sight of its
whole happy population, come out to welcome and greet you with a
universal jubilee. Yonder proud ships, by a felicity of position
appropriately lying at the foot of this mount, and seeming fondly to
cling around it, are not means of annoyance to you, but your country's
own means of distinction and defence. All is peace; and God has granted
you this sight of your country's happiness, ere you slumber in the
grave. He has allowed you to behold and to partake the reward of your
patriotic toils; and he has allowed us, your sons and countrymen, to
meet you here, and in the name of the present generation, in the name of
your country, in the name of liberty, to thank you!
[Sidenote: The dead patriots.]
But, alas! you are not all here! Time and the sword have thinned your
ranks. Prescott, Putnam, Stark, Brooks, Read, Pomeroy, Bridge! our eyes
seek for you in vain amid this broken band. You are gathered to your
fathers, and live only to your country in her grateful remembrance and
your own bright example. But let us not too much grieve that you have
met the common fate of men. You lived at least long enough to know that
your work had been nobly and successfully accomplished. You lived to see
your country's independence established, and to sheathe your swords from
war. On the light of Liberty you saw arise the light of Peace, like
"another morn,
Risen on mid-noon;"
and the sky on which you closed your eyes was cloudless.
[Illustration: _Joseph Warren._]
But ah! Him![9] the first great martyr in this great cause! Him! The
premature victim of his own self-devoting heart! Him! the lead of our
civil councils, and the destined leader of our military bands, whom
nothing brought hither but the unquenchable fire of his own spirit! Him!
cut off by Providence in the hour of overwhelming anxiety and thick
gloom; falling ere he saw the star of his country rise; pouring out his
generous blood like water, before he knew whether it would fertilize a
land of freedom or of bondage!--how shall I struggle with the emotions
that stifle the utterance of thy name! Our poor work may perish; but
thine shall endure! This monument may moulder away; the soil ground it
rests upon may sink down to a level with the sea; but thy memory shall
not fail! Wheresoever among men a heart shall be found that beats to the
transports of patriotism and liberty, its aspirations shall be to claim
kindred with thy spirit!
But the scene amidst which we stand does not permit us to confine our
thoughts or our sympathies to those fearless spirits who hazarded or
lost their lives on this consecrated spot. We have the happiness to
rejoice here in the presence of a most worthy representation of the
survivors of the whole Revolutionary army.
[Sidenote: The veterans of the Revolution.]
Veterans! you are the remnant of many a well-fought field. You bring
with you marks of honor from Trenton and Monmouth, from Yorktown,
Camden, Bennington, and Saratoga. Veterans of half a century! when in
your youthful days you put everything at hazard in your country's cause,
good as that cause was, and sanguine as youth is, still your fondest
hopes did not stretch onward to an hour like this! At a period to which
you could not reasonably have expected to arrive, at a moment of
national prosperity such as you could never have foreseen, you are now
met here to enjoy the fellowship of old soldiers, and to receive the
overflowings of a universal gratitude.
But your agitated countenances and your heaving breasts inform me that
even this is not an unmixed joy. I perceive that a tumult of contending
feelings rushes upon you. The images of the dead, as well as the persons
of the living, present themselves before you. The scene overwhelms you,
and I turn from it. May the Father of all mercies smile upon your
declining years, and bless them! And when you shall here have exchanged
your embraces, when you shall once more have pressed the hands which
have been so often extended to give succor in adversity, or grasped in
the exultation of victory, then look abroad upon this lovely land which
your young valor defended, and mark the happiness with which it is
filled; yea, look abroad upon the whole earth, and see what a name you
have contributed to give to your country, and what a praise you have
added to freedom, and then rejoice in the sympathy and gratitude which
beam upon your last days from the improved condition of mankind!
[Sidenote: Tribute to Lafayette.]
Sir, we are assembled to commemorate the establishment of great public
principles of liberty, and to do honor to the distinguished dead. The
occasion is too severe for eulogy of the living. But, Sir, your
interesting relation to this country, the peculiar circumstances which
surround you and surround us, call on me to express the happiness which
we derive from your presence and aid in this solemn commemoration.[10]
Fortunate, fortunate man! with what measure of devotion will you not
thank God for the circumstances of your extraordinary life! You are
connected with both hemispheres and with two generations. Heaven saw
fit to ordain that the electric spark of liberty should be conducted,
through you, from the New World to the Old; and we, who are now here to
perform this duty of patriotism, have all of us long ago received it in
charge from our fathers to cherish your name and your virtues. You will
account it an instance of your good fortune, Sir, that you crossed the
seas to visit us at a time which enables you to be present at this
solemnity. You now behold the field, the renown of which reached you in
the heart of France, and caused a thrill in your ardent bosom. You see
the lines of the little redoubt thrown up by the incredible diligence of
Prescott; defended, to the last extremity, by his lion-hearted valor;
and within which the corner-stone of our monument has now taken its
position. You see where Warren fell, and where Parker, Gardner,
McCleary, Moore, and other early patriots, fell with him. Those who
survived that day, and whose lives have been prolonged to the present
hour, are now around you. Some of them you have known in the trying
scenes of the war. Behold! they now stretch forth their feeble arms to
embrace you. Behold! they raise their trembling voices to invoke the
blessing of God on you and yours forever.
[Illustration: _Marquis de Lafayette._]
Sir, you have assisted us in laying the foundation of this structure.
You have heard us rehearse, with our feeble commendation, the names of
departed patriots. Monuments and eulogy belong to the dead. We give them
this day to Warren and his associates. On other occasions they have been
given to your more immediate companions in arms, to Washington, to
Greene, to Gates, to Sullivan, and to Lincoln. We have become reluctant
to grant these, our highest and last honors, further. We would gladly
hold them yet back from the little remnant of that immortal band. _Serus
in coelum redeas._[11] Illustrious as are your merits, yet far, oh,
very far distant be the day when any inscription shall bear your name,
or any tongue pronounce its eulogy!
[Sidenote: The common progress of nations.]
The leading reflection to which this occasion seems to invite us
respects the great changes which have happened in the fifty years since
the battle of Bunker Hill was fought. And it peculiarly marks the
character of the present age, that, in looking at these changes, and in
estimating their effect on our condition, we are obliged to consider,
not what has been done in our own country only, but in others also. In
these interesting times, while nations are making separate and
individual advances in improvement, they make, too, a common progress;
like vessels on a common tide, propelled by the gales at different
rates, according to their several structure and management, but all
moved forward by one mighty current, strong enough to bear onward
whatever does not sink beneath it.
A chief distinction of the present day is a community of opinions and
knowledge amongst men in different nations, existing in a degree
heretofore unknown. Knowledge has, in our time, triumphed, and is
triumphing, over distance, over difference of languages, over diversity
of habits, over prejudice, and over bigotry. The civilized and Christian
world is fast learning the great lesson, that difference of nation does
not imply necessary hostility, and that all contact need not be war. The
whole world is becoming a common field for intellect to act in. Energy
of mind, genius, power, wheresoever it exists, may speak out in any
tongue, and the world will hear it. A great chord of sentiment and
feeling runs through two continents, and vibrates over both. Every
breeze wafts intelligence from country to country; every wave rolls it;
all give it forth, and all in turn receive it. There is a vast commerce
of ideas; there are marts and exchanges for intellectual discoveries,
and a wonderful fellowship of those individual intelligences which make
up the mind and opinion of the age. Mind is the great lever of all
things; human thought is the process by which human ends are ultimately
answered; and the diffusion of knowledge, so astonishing in the last
half-century, has rendered innumerable minds, variously gifted by
nature, competent to be competitors or fellow-workers on the theatre of
intellectual operation.
[Sidenote: Influence of the American Revolution upon Europe.]
The great wheel of political revolution began to move in America. Here
its rotation was guarded, regular, and safe. Transferred to the other
continent, from unfortunate but natural causes, it received an irregular
and violent impulse; it whirled along with a fearful celerity; till at
length, like the chariot-wheels in the races of antiquity, it took fire
from the rapidity of its own motion, and blazed onward, spreading
conflagration and terror around.
We learn from the result of this experiment, how fortunate was our own
condition, and how admirably the character of our people was calculated
for setting the great example of popular governments. The possession of
power did not turn the heads of the American people, for they had long
been in the habit of exercising a great degree of self-control. Although
the paramount authority of the parent state existed over them, yet a
large field of legislation had always been open to our Colonial
assemblies. They were accustomed to representative bodies and the forms
of free government; they understood the doctrine of the division of
power among different branches, and the necessity of checks on each. The
character of our countrymen, moreover, was sober, moral, and religious;
and there was little in the change to shock their feelings of justice
and humanity, or even to disturb an honest prejudice. We had no domestic
throne to overturn, no privileged orders to cast down, no violent
changes of property to encounter. In the American Revolution, no man
sought or wished for more than to defend and enjoy his own. None hoped
for plunder or for spoil. Rapacity was unknown to it; the axe was not
among the instruments of its accomplishment; and we all know that it
could not have lived a single day under any well-founded imputation of
possessing a tendency adverse to the Christian religion.
It need not surprise us, that, under circumstances less auspicious,
political revolutions elsewhere, even when well intended, have
terminated differently. It is, indeed, a great achievement, it is the
master-work of the world, to establish governments entirely popular on
lasting foundations; nor is it easy, indeed, to introduce the popular
principle at all into governments to which it has been altogether a
stranger. It cannot be doubted, however, that Europe has come out of
the contest, in which she has been so long engaged, with greatly
superior knowledge, and, in many respects, in a highly improved
condition. Whatever benefit has been acquired is likely to be retained,
for it consists mainly in the acquisition of more enlightened ideas. And
although kingdoms and provinces may be wrested from the hands that hold
them, in the same manner they were obtained; although ordinary and
vulgar power may, in human affairs, be lost as it has been won; yet it
is the glorious prerogative of the empire of knowledge, that what it
gains it never loses. On the contrary, it increases by the multiple of
its power; all its ends become means; all its attainments, helps to new
conquests. Its whole abundant harvest is but so much seed wheat, and
nothing has limited, and nothing can limit the amount of ultimate
product.
[Sidenote: The representative system of government.]