Address of John Quincy Adams, 1793

Old Glory in the Sky.

ADDRESS OF JOHN QUINCY ADAMS (July 4, I793, Boston.)

       Americans! let us pause for a moment to consider the situation of our country at that eventful day when our national existence commenced. In the full possession and enjoyment of all those prerogatives for which you then dared to adventure upon ''all the varieties of untried being," the calm and settled moderation of the mind is scarcely competent to conceive the tone of heroism to which the souls of free-men were exalted in that hour of perilous magnanimity.
       Seventeen times has the sun, in the progress of his annual revolution, diffused his prolific radiance over the plains of independent America. Millions of hearts, which then palpitated with the rapturous glow of patriotism, have already been translated to brighter worlds; to the abodes of more than mortal freedom.
       Other millions have arisen, to receive from their parents and benefactors an inestimable recompense of their achievements.
       A large proportion of the audience, whose benevolence is at this moment listening to the speaker of the day, like him, were at that period too little advanced beyond the threshold of life to partake of the divine enthusiasm which inspired the American bosom: which prompted her voice to proclaim defiance to the thunders of Britain; which consecrated the banners of her armies ; and finally erected the holy temple of American Liberty over the tomb of departed tyranny.
       It is from those who have already passed the meridian of life; it is from you, ye venerable assertors of the rights of mankind, that we are to be informed what were the feelings which swayed within your breasts and impelled you to action; when, like the stripling of Israel, with scarcely a weapon to attack, and without a shield for your defense, you met and, undismayed, engaged with the gigantic greatness of the British power.
       Untutored in the disgraceful science of human butchery; destitute of the fatal materials which the ingenuity of man has combined to sharpen the scythe of death; unsupported by the arm of any friendly alliance, and unfortified against the powerful assaults of an unrelenting enemy, you did not hesitate at that moment, when your coasts were infested by a formidable fleet, when your territories were invaded by a numerous and veteran army, to pronounce the sentence of eternal separation from Britain, and to throw the gauntlet at a power, the terror of whose recent triumphs was almost coextensive with the earth.
       The interested and selfish propensities which, in times of prosperous tranquillity, have such powerful dominion over the heart, were all expelled, and in their stead the public virtues, the spirit of personal devotion to the common cause, a contempt of every danger, in comparison with the subserviency of the country, had assumed an unlimited control.
       The passion for the public had absorbed all the rest, as the glorious luminary of heaven extinguishes, in a flood of refulgence, the twinkling splendor of every inferior planet. Those of you, my countrymen, who were actors in those interesting scenes will best know how feeble and impotent is the language of this description, to express the impassioned emotions of the soul with which you were then agitated.
       Yet it were injustice to conclude from thence, or from the greater prevalence of private and personal motives in these days of calm serenity, that your sons have degenerated from the virtues of their fathers. Let it rather be a subject of pleasing reflection to you than the generous and disinterested energies which you were summoned to display, are permitted, by the bountiful indulgence of heaven, to remain latent in the bosoms of your children.
       From the present prosperous appearance of our public affairs, we may admit a rational hope that our country will have no occasion to require of us those extraordinary and heroic exertions, which it was your fortune to exhibit.
       But from the common versatility of all human destiny, should the prospect hereafter darken, and the clouds of public misfortune thicken to a tempest; should the voice of our country's calamity ever call us to her relief, we swear, by the precious memory of the sages who toiled and of the heroes who bled in her defense, that we will prove ourselves not unworthy of the prize which they so dearly purchased; that we will act as the faithful disciples of those who so magnanimously taught us the instructive lesson of republican virtue.