Rutland weekly herald. [volume] (Rutland, Vt.) 1859-1877, 1865-07-13

rushed madly into the contest, To him
who trusts the power above all earthly
believes that God rules us
to-day as he did our patriot fathers, the
issue of such cause founded In such
wickedness has never appeared doubt
full,
To-day fellow citizens, we come back
TO the Declaration of Independence,
Like the prodigal who left his fathers
house and wasted his substance In riot
Gus living, we return once more 10 the
house built for us in our infancy TO en-
Joy its sweet memories and its dear as
sociations, By the light of It's great
truths we judge of our wanderlngs and
cling more lovingly and tenderly TO 1t
now, from the fact that in these long
years, a strong and mighty nation, sec
ond to none on the face of the globe has
forgotten its early virtues and wandered
from its early landmarks.
The growth of America has been al
most magical. When we remember that
two hundred and forty. five years ago,
no white family lived in all New Eng
land, we will realize that nation has
sprung into being with a rapidity which
fills us with wonder and astonishment.
From mere handful of colonists, un-
known save as dependencies upon Brit
tannia, we have bounded in eighty nine
years to the head of the nations of the
earth The fact is we have been intoXl-
Gated by the rapid strides we have made
in onr national being, until we vainly
believed that our status was liked be-
yond peradventure. We have been ac-
customed to look at our future only in
the light of our past, and in this to es-
innate our security and measure our
future glory and renown. We have
forgotten that man proposes and God
disposes. The fearful lessons of Assyr-
ia and Babylon, Greece and Rome
have been lost to us while we dreamed
of the western continent outrtrippin
the east in all her wealth, grandeur and
glory.
History teaches no lesson more en-
phatically than that a nation founded
in oppression and wrong must repent
and reform or it will perish. No mat
ter how rich, how powerful, how exalt-
ed in arts, sciences and war, the alterna-
tive Of repentance or death is sometime
in its history sure to come. That peo-
pie are wise who ere the dark shadow
comes, spring to newer and holier life.
That people are saved who are not
blinded by the glitter of their own pow
er and grandeur, but can see through all
the little clouds which betoken the
coming storm. 1t is because sof our
very prosperity-because of our rapid
strides in the elements of national
greatness that we have never stopped
until now to do justice, simple justice,
to race we have enslaved. We have
lived lie to the Declaration of indie
pendence for eighty nine years, and not
withstanding our national sins and our
glaring injustice to weaker race-nOt-
withstanding the admonitions of the
wise and good the world over, we have
gone ON rom step to step in aggrandize-
ment and power, publishing to the world
that our America was the land of the
free and the home of the oppressed of
the whole earth, while year by year we
were riveting more firmly the chains of
slavery on the negro race. 1t is no
wonder that in the light of the truth of
history our great apostle should have
declared years ago that he trembled for
the fate of the nation, when he reflected
that God was just. The Declaration of
Independence fresh from patriot hands,
had charged the crime of slavery on the
mother country. Through the prayers,
tears and blood of the people, the Dec
laration was established, and instead of
WiDing ont the sin Of tho nation in the
hour of its triumph, we forgot our
promise to God, and still bound in
chains the weaker race. We laid broad
and deep the foundations of Republic
based upon the truths of God and the
rights of man, but in building the edi-
flee we introduced material which must
be replaced by better, or the structure
must .crumble in ruins.
We cannot shut our eyes to the facts
Of history, and we therefore see that in
the formation of the Constitution the
bond of slavery was introduced. When
its trainers sat down to their work all
the states north of Maryland had abol-
ished or were committed to the aboli
ton of slavery. They knew its crime
they felt its sin and shame. In harmony
with the Declaration of Independence
they desired to establish bond of con-
stltutiOnal union in accordance with the
domestic policy of their own States.
SIX states had built up an aristoCracy of
slavery, They would not deny the
truths OF the Declaration of Independ-
ence-they would not defend the anon
ally of slavery in a land of freedom.
They would leave it to state sovereign
ties to control and to the march of an
enlightened public opinion to abolish.
They demanded as political necessity
the continuance of the slave trade, The
rendition of fugitives and a representa-
ton Of three fifths of the slaves as q
condition to their adoption of the con-
stitutlon. A historian of these times
says that our fathers driven to the
of either sacrificing the
Union or the principles of liberty,
yielded in an evil hour to the demands |
by which they were opposed-smothered |
their consciences - forgot what they
owed to justice and to God-averted |
their faces-bowed their heads and with
trembling hand signed the bond which
made slavery forever after the vital |
principle Of the American Government" |
The hope of the wise and the good |
was then anchored in the belief that the
march of public sentiment and the en-
lightened conscience of men would |
steadily and surely work out the deliy-