Meigs County telegraph. [volume] (Pomeroy [Ohio]) 1848-1859, 1857-03-10

ward our shores, that its ignorance and
vice-wave overtopping wave-roll in upon
the land, the danger assumes startling as
pect. In about torty-hve years from this
day, our population shall equal the present
aggregate population of England, France,
Switzerland, Spain, Portugal, Sweden, and
Denmark. A step further in the calcula-
ton presents prospect still more surpri-
sing and impressive, in about seventy-tive
years we use exact terms, for we. reckon by |
exact data) from to-day, this mighty mass
of comminoled peoples will have swollen
to the stupendous aggregate of t,0o hu1a-
sfed ssssst fdggy iS 0siiiions---e -equaling the
present population of all Europe. Accord
ing to the statistics of life, there are hun
dreds of thousands of our present popula-
tion-one twenty-ninth at least-who will
witness this truly grand result. What
have you; friends of education and rellg-
ion, what have you to do within that time!
Your present intellectual and moral pro-
visions for the people are, as we have said,
far short of the wants of your present
twenty-seven millions; and i'll seventy five
years YOU must provide for two hundred
and nineteen additional millions, and these
millions, to a great extent, composed OF
semi -barbarous foreigners and their mis-
trained children.
Look at the facts, we again repeat. Pon-
der them, and let every good man who has
a cent to give or prayer to offer for his
country, feel that on us, the citizens OF the
republic, at this the middle of the nine
tenth century, devolves moral exigency
such as, perhaps, no other land ever saw
an exigency as full Of sublimity as 1t is
of urgency-as grand In It's opportunity
J as it is in its magnificent peril
This immense prospective population
certain, though prospective-is to be
thrown out, by the almighty hand of Prov
idence, upon one of the grandest arenas of
the world. Here, on this large continent,
bounded in its distant independence by the
Atlantic, the Pacific, the great tropic gulf,
and the Arctic-hera, away from the ira
ditional governments, and faiths and other
antiduated checks of the old world, it is to
play its great drama of destiny-of desti-
nv which, as we have shown, must, nu-
, mercally at least, be in seventy-f years
as potential as all present Europe, and how
much more potential in all moral, political,
and commercial respects? What an idea
would it be, that CT all Europe consolida-
: ted into one mighty, untrammeled com
u = monwealth, in the highest civilization, lib
i erty reli = ious emil hghtenment, and industri-
al developement-and this mighty revolu
y q ton to be completed in seventy-hve years
u from day to day Who would credit the
"" "" conception Yet our republic will, in that
Il time, more than realize the stupendous
: idea, if it's unity and moral character be
= not sacrificed.
Look at its field. According to an Off
y cial report, the total area of the United
+ States and territories in 1853 was 1888,
l58 square miles. This estimate is found
to be even short of the truth: various Of
u fetal reports from the Land Office, and the
. aggregate of the census, show 1920, ,57s
:; square miles.
= 1t is estimated from these facts that the
. territorial extent of the republic is nearly
=, ten times as large as that of Great Britain
% and France united, three times as large az
~ the whole of Britain, France, Austria
~ Prussia, Spain, Portugal, Belgium, Hol-
n land, and Denmark combined; one and
is half times as laage as the Russian empire
,c in Europe; onesiXth less only than tn
r. area covered by the fifty-nine or sixty EN-
- pres, states. or republics OF Europe; o
equal extent with the Roman empire, ol
=, that of Alexander, neither of which is sale
If to have exceeded three millions Of square
ia miles.
- Look at one other fact----a most interest
fa ing one-the large proportion of our J"0e''
: lie population. 1t is a most lmpresslv
argument for the friends of education, ant
60 especially Of Sunday schools. Where Their
le is plenty Of food, as there must indefinite
Mt ly be IN this country, there will always b
of plenty of children. 1t is benehcent,
~ beautiful law; but this remark only en- pas
. 3 sent Nore tha7, half oar present a0ht
ro popuZotio1a are yet in what may be calle
-, the flower of youth We almost literall
~ present an example of national adolescence
~ the freshness, the ardor, the vigor, an
,s the susceptibility of childhood and youn&
It., manhood. The white population in 185
To- was 10, 553 ,O68; that portion which wa
10 under twenty years of age, 10, l3O, 731
of under one year, 537, ,661; between one an
five, 2 2,348,797; five and ten, 9 7o4. 1873
ten and fifteen, 2,402, 1873; fifteen an
ae twenty, 2,128,1l6. Total, 10, 80, 73
AL Pause here, educators, Sunday scho'
'nS teachers and patrons, all you upon who1
~ devolves the instruction of the young
'he the country, or who have the pecunlal
IA Ia means of providing it; see you not that l
'ui nal destiny is in your hands The PoPulatle
M Mlal of to-day is to surpass all the millions
on Europe in about seventy-fve years; ar
wo you, yes, precisely you, hold within yor
ei- power one half of the population OF to-da
III III one half the present elements OF the graz
ar peometrical progression. Work out, the
zen with a tireless hand and sublime CO.
'rs' seriousness, this mighty arithmetic of de
6 = tiny.
has - 6 IL .,h;oot Wa ba,
ID u not introduced our calculations to croi
ol over them; they are grave, they are i
VIC We deed solemn in their Importance, but the
AiSI obolIapora I1s IN action not to despair. v