Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1855-12-24
0be Flallp spp.
pngrIn celehra.iea .. Plymou.I..

on Plymouth Rock, in 1920, was eele-
brsted at Plymouth on Friday last, under
the auspices of the Pilgrim Society. The
weather was delightful, and the day was, as
usual, observed as holiday by all classes of
the citizens. Hundreds of people hocked in
to the town from the adjoining country, and
delegations were also present from Boston aid
other cities. The celebration, this year, was
distinguished from many of previous years,
in the nobleness and progressive natuLe OF the
sentiments avowed, not only in the magnif-
cent grafton Of Senator Seward, but some of
the other speakers. Wendell Phillips, being
present, was called upon, and made one Of
his inimitable and Characteristic speeches,
report of which we give below.
It's represented that there were over one
thousand participants n the ceremonies of the
dsy. The visitors from abroad, on their ARR
val. were received at Pilgrim Hall. where an
opportunity was allowed them to inspect the
relics of the past which are there deposited
At eleven o'clock q procession was formed
and proceeded to the Unitarian Church,
where the Grafton was delivered, and other
services perfoi med.
After the usual preliminary ceremonies OF
prayer, singing, &C., were performed, the or
ator Of the occasion, the Hon. William H.
Seward of New York, was introduced, who
proceeded to deliver one of the most able, elo-
quent, and finished productions, which it has
ever been our province to peruse. 1t was
alive, throughout, with the ,blest sentiments
Of Freedom. sSeh rs it does ones soul good
to appreciate, in fhese days of degeneracy and
doughfaceism. The celebrated Grafton of
D1niel Webster, on the second centennial an~
niYersary, in 1920. was not more impressive
ly grand. or more thoroughly denunciatory Of
the pro- slayeryism of his time. But we re-
joice in the confidence that the parallel be-
tween them viii stop there, and that unlike
his great prototype, the so called Defender
of the Constitution" Mr. Seward may con.
tinue to preserve. to the end of his career,
the much more meritorious title of Defender
of Freedom.
To show the general tone Of. Senator Sew
ards address, which occupied three hours and
q half in the delivery, we give few short
extracts. Speaking OF the true spirit of the
Pilgrims, illustrated in their history previous
to their embarkation to these shores, he
said
1t hae, by its potent command, addressed
TO the conscience of Christendom, abolished
: throughout Europe that system of PERSONAL
serYitude in which large, pcrhaps the largest
portion of every community, had been held,
under every form of government. 1t bore its
testimony steadily against that system every
where. declaring that /" God and Nature
equally cry out against human slavery !; that
serfs and slaves are part of the human fam
ilT which Christ died to redeem; and that
equality is an essential incident Of that broth
erhood which he enjoins as test by which
his disciples shall be kpown."
The foundations of that comprehensive in
ternational code, which is now everywhere
accepted, were broadly laid 1t was then
cleady taught that " there are in nature cer-
tain fountains of justice, from which all pure
civil laws flow, varying only in this-that, as
waters take tinetpres and tastes from rhe soils
through which they run, so do civil laws diff
fer according to the regions and governments
ready summoned Europe to a new and more
vigorous morality. and Calvin's sharp voice
was ringing through the continent, calling the
faithful away from all ostentatious ceremonies
of worship, to that pure and spiritual one
which God prefers " before ell temples .
Abiding to the extraordinary frmness and
perseverance, manifested by the Puritans,
amid the most severe and unrelenting perse-
cutions, and the attempts made to induce
themto compromise their principles, by yield
ing to tyrannical and goddess human statutes,
in opposition to the higher law Of God, and
the sacred right Of private conscience, Gov.
Seward says:
More than one hundred years virtually out
jawed as citizens and subjects, and outcasts
from the established church, the Puritans bore
nnhinchingly their unwavering testimony
against the compromise, before magistrates
and councils, in the pillory, under stripes, in
marches, in camps, IN prisons, in flight, in
exile, among licentious soldfery and dissolute
companions in ncighboring lands; on the
broad and then UNEMPLOYED ocean, when the
mariners lost their reckoning, and the ships
supplies became ecanty and hei seams opened
to the waves; on unknown coasts, homeless,
houseless, and furnishing; in the eafiess for
est, surrounded by ice and snow, fearful of
savage beasts and confronting savage men,
The compromise policy failed, civil and relig-
ious liberty was not overborne; it rose erect !;
il triumphed; it is still gaining new and wild
er and more enduring trlumphs and tyrants
have read anew the lesson, SO often wasted
upon them before that where mankind stand
upon their convictions of moral right and du-
~, in disobedience to civil authority, there is
no middle course OF dealing, with them, be-
tween the persecution that exterminates, and
the federation that satisfies. The Pu1itans
were not exterminated, they were not salts.
fed.
The Puritans thus persisted and prevailed,
because they had adopted one true, singular,
and sublime principe OF civil conduct, name
ly: that the subject in every State has nat
ural right TO religious liberty of Conscience
They knew too well the weakness of human
guarantees Of civil liberty, and the frailty of
civil barriers against tyranny. Theytherefore
did not affect to derive the right Of toleration
from the common law or the statutes of the
realm, or magma charta, or even from that inn
aginary contest between the sovereign and the
subject, which some publicists had about that
time invented as basis for civil rights. They
resorted directly to law, broader, older, and
more stable than all these--a law universal in
is application and in its obligation, establish
ed by the Creator and Judge Of all men, and
therefore paramount 10 oil human Constitu-
tons. Algernon Sidney, Locke, and Bacon,