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| Glorious Fourth postcard |
On the anniversary of so great an event as the birth of the empire in which we live, none will question the propriety of passing a few moments in contemplating the various objects suggested to the mind by the important occasion ; and while the nourishment, the growth, and even the existence of our empire depend upon the united efforts of an extensive and divided people, the duties of this day ascend from amusement and congratulation to a serious patriotic employment.
We are assembled, not to boast, but to realize, not to inflate our national vanity by a pompous relation of past achievements in the council or the field, but, from a modest retrospect of the truly dignified part already acted by our countrymen, from an accurate view of our present situation, and from an anticipation of the scenes that remain to be unfolded, to discern and familiarize the duties that still await us as citizens, as soldiers, and as men.
Revolutions in other countries have been affected by accident. The faculties of human reason and the rights of human nature have been the sport of chance and the prey of ambition. When indignation has burst the bands of slavery, to the destruction of one tyrant, it was only to impose the manacles of another. This arose from the imperfection of that early stage of society, the foundations of empires being laid in ignorance, with a total inability of foreseeing the improvements of civilization, or of adapting government to a state of social refinement. On the western continent a new task, totally unknown to the legislators of other nations, was imposed upon the fathers of the American empire. Here was a people, lords of the soil on which they trod, commanding a prodigious length of coast, and an equal breadth of frontier, a people habituated to liberty, professing a mild and benevolent religion, and highly advanced in science and civilization. To conduct such a people in a revolution, the address must be made to reason, as well as the passions.
In what other age or nation has a people, at ease upon their own farms, secure and distant from the approach of fleets and armies, tide-waiters and stamp-masters, reasoned, before they had felt, and, from the dictates of duty and conscience, encountered dangers, distress, and poverty, for the sake of securing to posterity a government of independence and peace? Here was no Cromwell to inflame the people with bigotry and zeal; no Caesar to reward his followers with the spoils of vanquished foes; and no territory to be acquired by conquest. Ambition, superstition, and avarice, those universal torches of war, never illumined an American field of battle. But the permanent principles of sober policy spread through the colonies, roused the people to assert their rights, and conducted the revolution. Those principles were noble, as they were new and unprecedented in the history of human nations. The majority of a great people, on a subject which they understand, will never act wrong.
Our duty calls us to act worthy of the age and the country that gave us birth. Every possible encouragement for great and generous exertions is presented before us. The natural resources are inconceivably various and great The enterprising genius of the people promises a most rapid improvement in all the arts that embellish human nature. The blessings of a rational government will invite emigrations from the rest of the world and fill the empire with the worthiest and happiest of mankind; while the example of political wisdom and sagacity, here to be displayed, will excite emulation through the kingdoms of the earth, and meliorate the condition of the human race.
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